The Story of Us
by meluvblue
Summary: Not much was revealed about Wolf during Young Justice, but what if her story had been told? How would the story have changed if her secrets had been uncovered by the team? When wolf suddenly becomes human, no one could have anticipated just how drastically their lives - and the universe - would change. Tags: AU, rated M primarily for language/adult themes, slash & occasionally OOC.
1. Captured

Hello all!

Thank you for taking a chance on this story, it means a lot to me that you're willing to give it a look.

I'm trying to use this story as an opportunity to improve my writing skills, so any constructive criticism is greatly appreciated. This chapter is probably going to be the shortest one I do, so please don't be misled by how quickly you get through it. The other chapters will be a lot longer, I promise.

Disclaimer: I don't own Young Justice or any of the characters from the show.

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The strange gorilla was here again.

Taking in a deep breath, I could smell the oddly human scents clinging to his fur. Not too surprising, considering he dressed and walked like a human….but still.

The scent of the wild was long-gone from him despite his increasingly frequent visits, and it raised an alarm in my head whenever I caught his scent. This was the sixth day in a row I'd caught him searching my territory; his presence starting to wear on the patience of the rest of the pack. With two of our females almost ready to give birth to their pups, my family was feeling more protective and aggressive than usual. For the sake of the pack this gorilla-man, whatever his purpose, will have to die if he returns again tomorrow.

Keeping my body low to the ground, I shuffled forward as silently as possible to keep a clear line of sight on him. With his back to me, I couldn't tell what it was he was doing, only catching the sound of metal grinding together with the occasional high-pitched beeping noise coming out of the strange machine he had in his hands.

I watched him for hours that night; keeping my body hunched down while I watched the intimidating bulk of the gorilla-man as he continued his mysterious search. A little after the moon had reached t's peak in the sky, I heard a familiar rustling of leaves in the trees next to me. The twittering chatter of a squirrel sounded out in the darkness as it tried to crack a nut, startling the gorilla into snapping around and shooting a _weapon_ into the unsuspecting critter's direction; splitting the tree down the middle with a loud crack. Pushing as hard as I could off the ground as soon as I saw him start to move, I jumped back a few feet and tried to avoid the worst of the falling debris from crushing me.

Bewildered by the sudden turn in events, I stared at the gorilla-man with new conviction. If he could wield a gun then this intruder was more man than gorilla, whatever his appearance. And to aim with that much accuracy meant that he was too dangerous to allow him to stay here any longer. Knowing he posed too big a threat to my pack, I swallowed and made my decision.

There would be no seventh visit.

With the weapons he has at his disposal I desperately need backup, but I knew there would be no way to get it with the other wolves keeping watch over the vulnerable females in our cave or out hunting for food.

Seeing the gorilla put his gun away, I poked my head over a log and watched as he slung a bag over his left shoulder and walk away, his movements heading in the direction of where the river ran.

 _Not directly towards the pack's territory_ , I realized. _But definitely too close for comfort_.

If he managed to get to the river he might even run into one of the wolves out hunting. They'd definitely attack despite being unprepared for the damage this gorilla-man could do.

Running over to a thicket of bushes, I took a moment to figure out how I should bring him dowm. If I could at least injure him enough to draw blood then the scent of our fight would alert anyone upwind of the danger and hopefully have them come running, giving me the backup I'd need.

Seeing him pause and reach back into his bag after another few minutes, I saw my chance. Sprinting as fast as I possibly could, I leapt for his jugular, practically tasting the blood that would gush out of his neck, when suddenly I slammed into a strange blue wall of what could only be described as energy. Staggering off the ground, I tried to get my bearings and push through the pain hammering at me when I felt the vague sting of a needle hit my side and make my already blurry vision worse. Hearing heavy footsteps coming toward me, I raised my head and howled for everything I could. What felt like an eternity of calling out for my family, warning them, apologizing to them for my failure, was abruptly cut off by a painful kick to my side. The black shape of the gorilla-man against the fading blue glow of whatever it was that I'd hit was the last thing I saw before closing my eyes.

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 _Hell….._

Hell is hot. And somehow even though I never minded it before, the heat of India now seemed to squeeze itself around my bones and lungs; forcing me to feel the burning suffocation of the sun with every passing second I still lived.

As I discovered, there are only two types of creature in hell; the prisoners and their guards.

Since being captured every day that passed just brought a fresh new method of torture. With every new experiment conducted, every time our captors became bored needed a new way to pass the time, or every nightmare that plagued us when we were allowed the mercy of a fitful night's sleep; we've all come to the realization that there are no saviors. That there's nobody to rescue us.

No escape.

Before being captured by the gorilla-man I'd never killed a human. Sure I'd hunted and killed prey for food and scared off hunters getting too close to my pack, but I'd never once murdered a person. I more than made up for lost time once I was in the gorilla-man's and brain-machine's hold. Even with as desperately as I initially struggled and fought, I couldn't disobey the commands they sent through a mind control collar they forced us all to wear. Once that collar was on, we didn't even need to be restrained when they wanted to hurt us.

Over and over again we were betrayed by our own bodies as we sat there and allowed them to anything and everything they wanted.

I found out later that gorilla-man had been looking for me all along. After hearing rumors of a wolf pack in the forest, they'd wanted to capture the alpha to lead the pack of wolves they'd already taken prisoner. I haven't seen a single member of my old pack, which tells me they were either able to escape, or….killed. I try not to think about it too much – I've found that dwelling on what I've lost only makes it harder to get through the passing months.

I saw my reflection in a pond once. It was about a month after the last set of mutations they'd forced on my body; making me bigger, stronger and faster. I'd seen and felt how the changes had ripped the skin on my legs and back, but the shock I'd experienced when I saw myself fully for the first time revealed how greatly I'd underestimated how much they'd done to me. I could see how monstrously large I'd become, could see clearly the heavy scarring and enlarged fangs. And my eyes….the smallest physical change had felt like the most monumental. Where before my eyes had been blue, now they were an unnaturally bright molten-gold with the white's completely grayed out. When I saw my eyes, the eyes every animal around me sported, I saw the eyes of a monster.

Still, I count myself lucky in one respect. Neither the gorilla-man nor the brain-machine knows the secret of what I really am….Or what at least what I _was_.

Because I'm _not_ a wolf – not entirely.

But to properly tell you what I am, I'd have to tell you a much longer story; one that will sound impossible. You see, when I was kidnapped six months ago I thought my life had ended.

It wasn't until much later I realized that my life – and the story of it, was only just beginning.


	2. Alpha Male

It was unusually cool that night, with a soft wind blowing through the camp. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the respite from months of unending heat as I listened to the shuffling of my companions settling down for sleep around me. Maybe winter was coming? While a small part of me was glad for the coolness ruffling my fur, I worried for how much the temperature would drop and how many of us would survive until next spring. I opened my eyes and glanced around at the animals trying to sleep for the night. All were accounted for, except…

There was a new addition to our group. A few yards away, a herd of newly acquired elephants were huddled together in an exhausted mass of blood and exposed muscle. It was obvious they'd only just finished their last round of mutations. They were almost twice the size of a normal elephant, with angry red sections of ripped skin covering their bodies and vicious looking tusks extending out from their pained faces. The most telling sign of how recently they'd been changed was their eyes. Gold irises with the whites of their eyes completely blacked out.

I've been here almost six months, having completed the last of my own mutations five months ago. At first the whites of my eyes had also been blacked out, but as time goes on the black seems to fade away to gray. Mine are still pretty dark, but I've seen in others the gray become so light that it just looks more off-white than anything.

At any rate, I'm glad the elephants seem to be past the worst pain the mutations bring. The feeling of your skin being stretched over rapidly expanding muscle and bone until it actually rips apart is one of the most horrific and memorable things I've ever experienced. Every time I hear the screams of new animals being forced to endure the mutations, a fresh wave of my own memories in that hellish state disguised as nightmares haunts my sleep for weeks.

Satisfied that everyone is together and relatively safe, I settled back down for a night of restless sleep when I felt the familiar pain of an electrical shock from my collar. Without my own thought or control my body gets up and runs toward the lab building, where I see a dome-shaped machine with a brain lying safely behind protective glass at its top.

Rolling around to face me, I can hear excitement in its male voice as it gives me my orders.

"Mon beautiful Loup, we appear to have some airborne visitors. Take your pack and show them an agréable time, oui? Take les éléphants as well, it is a magnifique opportunity to see how they do after their recent improvements."

Saying nothing, I turned around and while ignoring every instinct I have screaming at me not to turn my back to it, ran back out the door towards the edge of the island. I didn't need to alert the others, I could already hear the pained yelps and smell the scent of singed hair and skin as the brain-machine shot electricity through their collars. They would follow.

I felt bad for the elephants, they obviously weren't in any shape to engage in battle but there wasn't anything I could do but follow my orders and hope they had enough energy to kill the humans they came across quickly. Putting too much strain on their bodies so soon after the trauma their bodies have undergone would kill them if they weren't careful. Besides, I've seen what happens to captured humans here and getting trampled to death by elephants is a thousand times kinder than what our kidnaper would do to them.

Approaching the only area on the small island outside our encampment with a big enough clearing to allow intruders to land on the island from the sky, I could smell several different scents in the area.

Seven different people; one female, five male, and one smelling so foreign and strange that I couldn't even identify the owner's gender. Three of the other scents catch my interest; among them a male smelling deeply of the ocean, almost like a fish.

The second is also male and it piques my interest in how attractive it is. It feels human, but has a strange undertone of something more. It has a very primal and satisfying weight to it that makes me want to roll around in the dirt where he must have been standing. Walking over to a tree where he must have leaned against it at some point, I have to stop myself from licking the bark and trying to taste the musky wildness in the scent calling to me so much.

Disturbed at my reaction, I forced myself to focus on the last scent of interest lightly skimming the top of a small pile of leaves. Rearing my head back in rage when I identify the person behind it, I can't stop a howl of anguish from bursting out of me.

It takes a moment longer than it should have to shake off the emotions, but that these people would bring a child to this place….don't they have any idea of the horrors that happen here?! If the child were to be caught, the brain-machine would not waste the opportunity to ravage and experiment on such a young mind even if only for the entertainment hearing their screams.

No, I'll track down and kill the child myself. The thought burns through the small fragment of soul I have left, but I would rather have that's child death on my conscience than ever let him suffer the fate that awaits him if he's captured alive. _I'll end it quickly and come back to bury him before the vultures feed,_ I promise myself but it doesn't do anything assuage the guilt I can already feel simmering in my heart.

Allowing myself a soft whine in the quite of the forest, I dash off back towards my pack so that we can take care of these humans as quickly as possible, and I pray that I'm in time to find the child first.

After a few minutes, I find and follow the scent of the other wolves until I reach a small clearing where I find them fighting off a human. What I see floors me, and I can't help pausing for a moment to watch the battle. Despite all their best efforts, the wolves seem to be doing very little damage to the man, who's throwing and attacking them as if they're no more than rambunctious puppies play tackling a vaguely annoyed father.

A snort of amusement leaves me at the imagery, and it takes a moment for it to register. There's been nothing here that amused or pleased me in the slightest in all the months I've been trapped on this hellhole, and some strange man with freaky steroid-strength brings out in me the equivalent of a dog chuckle? I catch a whiff of his scent, and I'm suddenly brought back to the clearing in the forest. He's the one with the good scent; the one with a hint of something that makes me think of an arousing ability and power to protect, successful hunts, and the essence of a man in his prime. Hearing the whine of one of the others, I stand up and try to clear my head so I can focus on the fight. I stand and watch as he tosses off the last wolf and looks around for any others, and I feel a wave of excitement roll through me. Putting my search for the child on hold momentarily, I wait for him to notice me. I'm a big white wolf after all, how long could it take? All I know is that I really want to fight him. The way he handled the others makes me think he can take what I dish out; maybe even beat me.

He finally turns around and sees me, and I can feel him take a moment to size me up, the same way I've been doing with him. The air itself starts feeling thick with anticipation, and with a growl of challenge I rush off my perch and tackle him, biting down on his arm and finding I barely break the skin. Thrown off almost as quickly as I'd tackled him, I land on my side less than yards away and jump up back on to my feet ready to attack again. He lunges for me while I sidestep and run up to a nearby tree and jump off it to land behind him. Pushing off the dirt underneath my hind legs, I feel the claws on my front paws dig into his back and I bite down on his shoulder while he struggles to push me off him.

It's brief, but he grunts and seems momentarily distracted by something; allowing me to use the opportunity to leverage myself enough to toss him into a boulder behind me. Taking a second to gather my breath, I try to see him through the dust that billowed up into the air after his fall and wait for him to attack. I twitch my ears as much as possible in an effort to detect his footsteps, but all I can hear is the pounding of my own heart beat.

Suddenly I feel something land roughly on my back and I hear the sound of crunching metal before the weight disappears again. Whirling around, I crouch down to pounce again when something makes me hesitate.

My neck….the collar is gone! My mind goes blank for a second, and I can feel weight of its control over me fade completely. The relief feels like a full body punch, it hits me so hard.

I'm free. I'm finally free. Such a simple thing, and I'm not under the control of that bastard brain-machine or that damn trigger happy gorilla-man. All those times I'd tried to take it off or break it myself….but the collar was designed to read my intentions and use pain to redirect them if needed. If I purposely tried to break the collar, it would electrocute me. Looking up, I can see the man watching me warily; not attacking but not unprepared for me to attack either.

There's a part of me that really wants to keep fighting for the sheer enjoyment I get from going head to head someone of equal strength and speed, but I owe this man my freedom. I don't know what he wants or why he's here, but if it's for the purpose of capturing or killing my kidnappers, he will have my help. I'll figure out what to do next after everything's done, but until then I'll be his ally if he wants me.

Trying to show him that I was no longer a threat I sit down and wag my tail, throwing out a bark and a little happy panting for good measure. It's embarrassing as hell and I will _never_ do it again, but we aren't the only ones on the island fighting for their lives and time is of the essence. I still had the child to think about too, but now that I'm free I have more options. As long as I don't get captured again, I can find the child and get him to safety without worrying about the collar activating and putting us both at risk.

The man slowly stands up out of his fighting stance and guardedly walks up to me, gingerly holding out a hand.

I don't blame him for the caution; I could tear the arm off a normal man. I regard his hand for a second and wonder how many fingers I could take off this one. Maybe not any, this guy seems to be made of strong stuff. Leaning forward I take in his scent for a moment and indulge in a quick lick that I regret almost immediately, because I suddenly understand why his smell calls to me so much.

I may not have always been a wolf, but I've been one long enough to recognize habits and pack standing. He might not be entirely human, but he wasn't wolf either. Still, he had the aura of an alpha with the power to back it up.

As an alpha myself, there's only two ways I could react to him. Either I feel the need kill him in order to maintain my position as top dog, or my wolf finds him a worthy candidate to be her mate – her equal.

And while I really did like fighting him, I haven't once felt truly threatened by his presence or the need to attack him and assert my authority.

Crap.

There is nothing more that I wanted right then than to feel like a bloodthirsty killer out to kill him and maintain my dominance but instead I had to resist the urge to plop myself down on the ground and let him give me a tummy rub.

…..And while the hesitant petting he's giving the top of my head right now _does_ feel fantastic, I know we have to get moving. Standing up and letting his hand fall back to his side with some regret, I look at him and with silent agreement we both start running towards base camp.

While we're running I try to sort through what I should do. I basically know nothing about this person other than his ability to fight. I don't know why he's here. It's rare to run into a human that carries the scent of the wild in them. _It's probably part of what makes him an alpha_ , I think, leaping over a fallen log. He hasn't killed me yet, and he _did_ break my collar. The fact that he didn't try attacking me again after my binding was gone suggested he somehow knew the collar was responsible for my actions. Maybe he was part of the military or something and was here to catch brain-machine and gorilla-man?

Seeing the building appear in front of us, I started changing direction in order to go through the front entrance but my companion kept moving straight for the stone wall. Curious about what he planned to do, I followed along and stand next to him when he stops less than a foot away and brings his arm back as if to punch it. _Is he really that strong?_ I wonder in amazement, moving back a step to avoid the debris and dust suddenly flying around as he breaks open a large hole. Immediately I can see the gorilla man picking himself up from the ground where he must have been knocked over and I instantly take the chance to pounce and knock him back down. Jumping off and gearing up for another attack I'm stopped by seeing the others I'd smelled earlier taking turns attacking him instead. Even with his guns, they're able to fight him off using incredible powers of their own; a male in a black bodysuit moving unbelievably fast and a green-skinned female that seemed to be able to use her mind to move things. To my alarm, during the fight gorilla-man was able to use his gun to shoot my human in the chest, but incredibly it seemed to have no effect; the bullets just bounced off.

Before I could refocus on the fight, the scent of the child I'd smelled earlier came back to me, and a barefooted male I hadn't seen before walked over to someone strapped to a surgical table and tore off his bindings. Assuming the child was safe for now, I moved towards the roaring gorilla-man who seemed to be preparing for an attack of his own.

"Try it. I _hate_ monkeys," My human said, walking up next to me and cracking my knuckles. I growled in agreement, ready to tear apart the brain-machine and gorilla-man that had imprisoned me for so long. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and tensed, seeing the brain-machine bring out a device from within its body.

"Non, Mallah. This will not be our Waterloo. Au revoir, mes amis," it intoned with regret. Despite not having eyes, I could feel his gaze land on me. "Au revoir mon Loupe. We will see each other again, I am sure".

The sound of a whirring machine became louder and the fast-boy from earlier shouted "Get down!" before the entire room became pitch black. Before my eyes could adjust, the room lit up again and the two creatures that stood in front of us were now gone.

Fuck! I'd been so close to ripping them apart with the very teeth _they_ had been responsible for elongating. I wanted to watch the life fade from their bodies with the same eyes they'd mutated and changed. The urge to cry out a howl of my rage and pain would have been impossible to ignore if my human hadn't put a warm hand on my hand, providing a small measure of comfort and distraction. Still, it pissed me off to know those bastards had gotten away with everything they'd done – a ll the people and animals they'd tortured and murdered.

"Wait. That big weapon thing was…..a light switch?" The fast-boy asked out loud, looking around in confusion. I wanted to bite him. _Obviously not, you moron. The light was out for only a second. Maybe brain-machine could have left that quickly and quietly, but not the gorilla-man._ I let out a growl and walked back outside, needing the fresh air. A moment later, I heard my human walking up behind me before settling down and waiting with me without speaking. For what, I don't know, but it was nice to have the moment of silence together.

Coming towards us, I could vaguely hear a conversation between fast-boy and a blond girl with arrows.

"What are _you_ grinning about?" She asked, sounding irritated.

"One word: souvenir!" he replied enthusiastically as they got closer.

"Two words: gorilla lice!" She shot back. With an amused smirk she walked the last few steps towards us leaving the redhead behind. With dawning comprehension, the speedster let out a sound of disgust and ripped off the red barrette gorilla-man had been wearing earlier that morning.

Amused, I turned my head to watch my human only to be happily surprised with him giving my neck and back a good petting.

"The rest of the pack is gone. What are you still doing here?" he asked playfully, lightly scratching behind my ears. I was reaching a point of zoned-out bliss as I was enveloped in the smell and feel of him when my last pin-prick of awareness caught footsteps coming in our direction.

Smelling the green-girl approaching, I lazily watched as she stopped next to us and smiled at him.

"I think he wants to stay with you" She commented, putting her arms behind her back and leaning forward a little to watch us better.

"Can I keep him?" he asked hopefully. The question surprised me; despite how much his scent called to me I couldn't imagine what made him think he could trust me. We teamed up for all of maybe a half hour and the enemy still managed to get away. For all he knows, I could still be under the influence of their control or be some insane wolf with rabies and a taste for human flesh. Hell, I could be–

Wait. They think I'm _male_?! You have _got_ to be _shitting_ me. Look, I get that I'm not the pretty little wolf I used to be, but frankly speaking I'm tall enough that these morons should be able to see the complete lack of dangling private parts on my body. Unless they think I'm neutered or genderless or something. The fact that the guy my wolf is interested in does not think I'm female in any way is a bit of blow to my ego.

I sighed and wished for….what I don't know, but I shook it off and tuned back in to their conversation.

"-this beast? Dude, you sure make a habit of collecting strays," the fast-boy was saying, gesturing toward me. With an amused look the strange-smelling green female crouched down next to my human and put her arm around him.

"Maybe because he's such a stray himself." she said softly, looking down into his eyes with a tender look. He didn't respond back, but met her eyes and stared back in to them. As the seconds went by without either of them moving or breaking eye contact I began to uncomfortably wonder if my human had already found a mate of his own. It was strange though, I'd never seen an alpha mate with a pack member of lesser standing before. And while she did smell of odd and foreign things I had a hard time placing, I knew with absolute certainty that she had no scent of alpha on her that didn't come from him. Shuffling a little closer to the pair I inhaled deeply to try and pick out any familiar scents that could help me unlock some of the mystery behind this green creature.

Humans need visual and verbal queues such as speaking and watching body language for them to understand the emotions of the people around them. Wolves however have an upper hand in that regard. Soon after becoming a wolf myself I discovered that if I concentrated enough I could actually _smell_ emotions. It took quite a bit of trial and error initially to figure what scents are associated with certain emotional states, but I was eventually able to make sense of some of them.

While animals are certainly able to experience emotions, they don't seem to have quite the same level of power and complexity behind it that humans do. That being said, sniffing out animal emotions is a lot easier than doing the same for humans, and since gaining my wolf form and the heightened sense of smell that came with it haven't exactly been around too many humans, so I haven't had much practice.

The ones I did were generally only hunters I needed to scare away from my territory or the terrified victims the gorilla-man and the brain-machine. Obviously I wasn't given much chance to smell out the more positive and uplifting emotions so I can't identify all of them. For that same reason however I've become a master at recognizing at the negative ones. Fear, depression, loneliness, and anger to name a few. I can smell the excitement of a hunter closing in on his prey and the glee the gorilla-man felt whenever he got his hands on a new weapon for him to test out. Even emotional pain has a scent. The closest I could ever come to describing the smell would be that of curdled milk with a hint of the metallic tang of blood.

Closing my eyes to try and focus more, I sifted through the different layers of scent and felt a buzz of apprehension brush through me as I explored further. There was the fading smokiness of anxiety closer to the surface, most likely from our recent battle, but it was another scent that concerned me. With how unusual her base scent is I hadn't been able to identify it, but now that I could tell it was there I had a hard time resisting the urge to gag on the overpowering strength of it.

Desperation – the bitter smell of citrus and sweat. I'd encountered it many times among the animals and humans unlucky enough to find themselves here, but I'd never smelled it so deeply in any living creature the way I did with this green-girl.

When emotions leave a scent it's a lot like a firework in the sense that that a strong blast of scent bursts out of someone before quickly fading away and allowing other scents to take over. Whatever this green-girl is so desperate for; she wants it with every breath she breathes. It clogs her pores and piggy-backs on all her other emotions with such force it must be an unbearable torture for her to live with. The sheer potency of it suggests her desperation has been building this way for months – if not years. Beginning to feel dizzy from burying myself in the smell for so long, I edged back and had to force myself to focus when the fast-guy started talking again.

"Well, he's gonna need a name. How about Krypto?" he asked, rocking back and forth from his toes to his heels in an obvious effort to expel some of the excess energy he seemed to have. I growled in protest over both the stupid name and being referred to as male yet again. My equally unimpressed human broke from the weirdly intense staring contest with the green-girl and only said "Pass."

"Besides, isn't that taken?" the green-girl asked, raising an eyebrow in question.

Annoyed, I tuned out of their useless conversation. A lot of things had happened in the last couple of hours and it was obvious I needed to start making some decisions about what I wanted to do next.

First of all, I was free. After wearing that damn collar for six months, I felt lighter both physically and mentally. Still, after all the things I was forced to see and do all that time left me struggling with the idea of leaving.

I'm not the same person I used to be. Literally. I've killed and tortured humans and animals alike, and even if it wasn't me in control it was still my body doing the damage and my mind an unwilling witness to every second of it.

I briefly considered staying and trying to help the animals here, but quickly discarded the idea. How could I possibly help? The pack I'd led here wasn't really mine, and I had no doubt the wolves that were in it have already begun to try travelling back to their old families. We'd been forced to be a pack but it didn't mean we really held any loyalty of obligation for each other.

I could try finding my way back to my old pack if they were still alive, but that option didn't really appeal to me either. It was guaranteed that I could reclaim my position as alpha; especially when the mutations increasing my size, speed, and strength were taken into consideration…..but still. I no longer had the option of finding a wolf mate – none could ever hope to be my equal now.

I don't know if I could take seeing my family continue to birth and raise children of their own every spring while I'm forced to live alone for the rest of my days. I love and miss them, but I know that I don't have it in me to be that selfless. Even before being taken I'd felt a growing desire to find my own mate and have family of my own; the problem now being that my choices had just become limited in how I was going to achieve that.

If I could no longer do that as a wolf then my only option from now on would be to find a human mate. That is, if I could even become human again myself. I'd changed back and forth a few times after first becoming a wolf, but it's now been almost a year and a half since I was last human. I'd felt tempted on multiple occasions to try transforming and escape after my capture but fear of what would happen to me if I was discovered had kept me from even trying. I would have been the ultimate prize in the brain-machine's long list of test subjects, and despite how bleak life here had been, I was willing to bet my life and freedom on the certainty that it would get unimaginably worse if it ever found out about what I could do.

I need to see if I can be human again. I'm painfully aware of the possibility that the mutations my body experienced may have affected my ability to do the transformation, but I have to at least try. What form I'll be living in will be the biggest determining factor in what I do from now on. The smart thing would probably be to let my human and his companions leave while I forge a separate path of my own and try to move on from here. Besides, if the way he interacted with the green-girl was any indication he isn't exactly available or open to having a mutant wolf-girl hybrid come on to him and try to start a family.

Still. Maybe it's just me being grateful towards my rescuer, or the hope that he ignited in me when I discovered there was someone out there capable of being my mate despite the all the mental and physical changes I've gone through…..And taking me wherever he's going is probably not nearly as big a deal for him as it is for me….but that he wants me at all touches me more than I'd thought it would. It makes me want to throw caution to the wind and follow him – consequences be damned.

Looking up at the man beside me, I tried to look at him the same way I would if I were human. Toned and muscled with a compact build, he had a strong and capable body without being too bulky. His hair was pitch black and cut short, with no sign of product or any particular attempt to style it. Set on a serious face, his eyes were a pretty light blue and remarkably held a hint of the look a child might have if they were lost. About the same height as I am in my current wolf form, he seemed to be tall for a human. All this pleases me, and I think the human in me finds all these qualities attractive and desirable.

I started trying to compile a list of pros and cons for going with him, but rolled my eyes and stopped. Even if it wasn't rational or at all smart, I already knew what I'd do.

When he got up and started walking with the others in his group towards a big red vehicle smelling of the green-girl I got up and followed him. As we got nearer, I saw the tall barefooted male smelling of saltwater and a shorter male wearing colorful clothes and a black mask talking in front of the entrance. Stopping a few feet away, the entire group seemed to be listening to their conversation.

"Look, I need to know. Why did you keep the mole intel a secret?" The masked-boy asked.

"The source of the tip was Sports Master." The other one replied, looking him square in the eyes.

"What?! You can't trust him!" A blond girl suddenly shouted, startling me into leaning away. Brushing against my human's side, I briefly closed my eyes as he absent-mindedly patted my back.

"I do not. It seemed possible – even likely that he was attempting to divide the team with false information." Sea-boy replied, unfazed by her outburst.

Nodding slowly, the masked-boy seemed to mull over the information for a moment.

"….Given how this mission went, he nearly succeeded. But still you had to consider it might be true…."

"Yes. As leader, I did. In which case I did not want to alert the traitor."

"I hate to say it, but….makes sense."

"I am still prepared to step down." Shaking his head, the masked-boy raised his arm instead.

"All in favor of keeping Aqualad as leader?" he called out.

Feeling my human's hand leave me, I watched as he joined the others in a unanimous vote of acceptance.

Striking a pose with his hands on his hips, the child I'd smelled earlier grinned at the group. Strange though, he had the appearance of a fully grown if not oddly dressed adult.

"Guess it's unanimous. See you tomorrow!" Waving in farewell, he turned around and began to walk away.

"You're not coming with us?" Sea-boy called out, confused.

"Nope, gotta fly!" He called back as he lifted off the ground and soared towards the sky without another look back.

Despite all the strange things I'd seen today, the image of a person flying through the air surprised me enough that I unceremoniously fell back on my ass in shock. Now that I thought about it, my human's strength and speed was _not_ normal. While the clothes the others were wearing had admittedly seemed weird, I'd shrugged it off as some weird fashion trend I'd missed out on in the last two years I'd been missing from human society. And what about the green-girl? After the battle I'd been pre-occupied with my decision to leave with my human, but right now I wanted to smack my head into a tree over my obliviousness around these people.

There was obviously more going on here than I'd first realized. Thinking sensibly, I should not be following them to god-knows where with so little information. Mind racing, I stayed seated while my human and his friends got up and made their way over towards the red automobile while exchanging light-hearted conversation.

"So what are you going to name him?" green-girl asked my human curiously.

"What's wrong with Wolf?" he answered back.

Wolf? I kinda liked it. I would have hated it if he'd tried to force a name on me that I didn't want or need. Not that it would matter, because these were obviously very powerful people with still unknown intentions.

"Wolf? You coming with me?" he called out hesitantly, poking his head back out of the vehicle and looking at me.

…Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if I went with him. It certainly couldn't be worse than the last six months I'd spent here. Even if I end up not wanting to stay with him, it would give me an opportunity to heal and rest for a while before I decide where to go next.

Standing up, I took one hesitant step forward and paused. Taking a deep breath, I could smell a hint of his scent waft around me where his hand had been resting a few minutes earlier. It still smelled heavenly, and it brought a sense of peace with it. It made me think of home; wherever _that_ was.

Feeling more resolute, I ran the rest of the way across the ground and up the ramp leading directly to him, not anticipating how slippery the metal would be under my paws. Stumbling forward, I ran right into him with my face buried in the crook of his neck.

The second I heard the rumble of surprised laughter coming from him as he wrapped his arms around my neck I knew I'd made the right choice.


	3. Revelation

Hey, thanks for your patience while waiting for this update. Heads up, there's gonna be some gory bits later in the chapter. Quick thanks to all of you who reviewed, it's a priceless gift of motivation and inspiration to hear from you and I really appreciate you sticking around for the rest of the story.

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It's been three weeks since I made the decision to follow my human, and except for the terrifying revelation that the ship I'd boarded had no seating for canines and was being piloted by an overly-enthusiastic teenage pilot from fucking _outer space,_ I'd been enjoying myself. I found out my new home would be on a small mountain off the coast of Rhode Island with several members of the people that had rescued me. To my delight my human was one of them and I was able to stay with him in his room.

As it turns out, the people I'd come with were bona fide superheroes - with the costumes and secret identities to match. They were all around my age and apparently working for another, larger group of adult heroes based somewhere else.

Once the ship had docked into a garage cut into the mountain we disembarked to find one of those adult heroes waiting for us. A tall, well-built man wearing a strangely-shaped mask watched us stoically until everyone was present. I'd been working hard to fight off the nausea and dizzying anxiety that had plagued me the moment I realized the red vehicle I'd boarded was actually a jet being driven by a green teenager that reeked of desperation, but seeing a grown man in black and grey spandex gave me enough pause to calm down. 

I'd never seen anything like it. The mask he was wearing had weird points on top, like it was imitating cat ears or something. Looking down, I snorted in amusement at the rest of the ensemble. A gold belt, really? And the black knee high boots? I started wheezing a little in an imitation of laughter when I focused in on my favorite part of his outfit: The black underwear. The dude was wearing black tighty-whiteys on the outside of the pretty little grey tights wrapped around his legs. I couldn't stop a little bark of hysterical laughter from escaping me at the site.

Feeling the warm touch of my humans hand on my side, I forced myself to turn and meet his curious eyes before giving a small nod and settling down. If the confused and disturbed looks being shot my way were anything to go by the others probably thought I was having a rabies-frenzy or something. Totally worth it though; I hadn't been _that_ amused in years, even before my first transformation from human to wolf. Ignoring me, the underwear-man cleared his throat and waited until everyone's attention was on him before speaking.

Though he had distant body language and was outwardly expressionless I could smell a small cloud of relief waft from him as he looked over the group. Scenting something else familiar about him, I took a moment to concentrate while he addressed the group and asked them to report on the mission's success. It took a moment, but I quickly realized he and the masked-boy in red and green shared a similar base scent. Looking between them I could see they carried themselves similarly as well and decided they must be family. Father and son maybe? It would definitely help explain the interesting way the masked-boy dressed himself if he'd had to grow up with a dad with such an unusual sense of fashion.

When the others became distracted and started going on an unrelated tangent during the report I watched as the two of them took the opportunity to exchange small nods and the hint of a smile before getting the others to focus again and finish their report. _Maybe the rest of the group doesn't know of their relationship?_ I wondered curiously. Why wouldn't they want the others to know? They'd all seemed pretty familiar with each other during the ride on the ship…..

"-and Wolf was among the animals we found working under the Brain's control."

Hearing my new name, my thoughts were unpleasantly cut off when I realized the topic of conversation had turned towards me. Feeling the prickle of awareness that always shot through me whenever something turned their attention to me, I looked up to see the stares of everyone there while the underwear-man asked for more information behind my presence.

Explaining where I'd come from and what I was as far as they knew, my human and his pack rushed to defend bringing me with them. It took nearly twenty minutes of convincing and pleading from them and an embarrassing attempt on my part to flash the eccentrically clad underwear-man puppy eyes before he finally gave in and gave the ok for me to be there – with conditions.

"Fine, it can stay provided he undergoes a full physical examination and blood analysis," he said with an undertone of irritation. Looking at me with a barely-concealed grimace, he added that I had to stay in the garage with a member of the team until I was given a flea-bath. Leaving it up to the teenagers around me, he turned and gave a dramatic flip of his cape before exiting through a green door that I later learned would lead deeper into the mountain's center. I barely had the time to feel insulted over my reaffirmed status as male around these people – _seriously, were they all fucking blind?_ – and the implication that I was so bad at keeping myself groomed that I had _fleas_ on me before the fast-boy gave an enthusiastic thumbs up and announced he was on it.

Zipping around too quickly for me to follow with my eyes, he reappeared triumphantly, inexplicably holding up an inflatable children's pool in his left hand. Blowing into it with a speed and skill that made me wonder what or _who_ he had to have practiced on in the past to get that good, he quickly finished and pulled over a hose attached to the garage wall to start filling it.

Grinning at the group, he tossed out a quick "I'll be back in a few minutes!" before zooming back out. True to his word, he came back four minutes later holding a couple boxes in his hands victoriously.

"The guy at the store said one box of this stuff would be enough to treat a large dog about the size of a golden retriever. Since Wolf is like three times that size I got two extra boxes. Better safe than sorry, right?" he asked before opening the boxes and dumping the white powder they contained into the pool. Using the hose to mix the solution evenly, he swirled it around until the water became cloudy and stood up.

"Wow, that's some strong stuff," The blond girl in a ponytail commented, wrinkling her nose in distaste. While the others nodded in agreement I had to hold myself back from growling at the pungent odor clouding my senses. Over my own discomfort I barely noticed my human gagging before covering his nose and mouth with both hands.

"Understatement of the century." He said in a muffled voice before turning around and walking a few steps away.

"Connor, are you okay?" green-girl asked in concern.

"I'll be fine," he answered back. "It just burns a little."

I couldn't agree more. The smell of the chemicals was strong enough for my eyes to water and make the inside of my nose start to burn uncomfortably. Backing away slowly from the menacing pool, I couldn't stop a whine of pain from escaping my throat as the stinging in my eyes and nose only grew stronger.

If it was this bad now, I couldn't even imagine how bad it would feel to actually be standing in that damned pool. _There is no way in hell I'm going in there!_ I thought to myself desperately, trying to keep my eyes open enough to find an escape.

"Well buddy, time to take a bath. Hop in!" The fast-boy called out to me encouragingly, tapping the side of the pool in invitation.

 _Fuck. You._ I growled back.

Confused, the idiot looked to my equally debilitated human expectantly.

"Uh, little help here big guy?" Ignored, he turned to green-girl and raised an eyebrow flirtatiously.

"How 'bout you beautiful? Care to give a guy a hand?"

Looking unsure, she glanced between my human and me.

"I don't know Wally, Wolf seems like he's pretty uncomfortable with the smell of the chemicals. If Connor is having a hard time being around this stuff I can't even imagine how strong it must be for an animal with such a sensitive sense of smell," she said doubtfully.

"Hey, I hear ya," he agreed, "but you heard what Batman said. He may be a genetically-altered super wolf with above average intelligence capable of teaming up and kicking bad-guy butt, but he's still a wild animal that's spent all its life in the jungles of India. I'd be more surprised if he _didn't_ have at least a couple bugs crawling on him right now. All it takes is one quick dunk in the pool and we'll all rest easier knowing we won't have to deal with his blood-sucking parasites finding their way to us."

Looking slightly more convinced if a little guilty, she bit her lip and nodded in silent agreement before turning towards me and raising her arm. I jerked in disorientation as I felt myself being slowly lifted off the floor. Trying to stay anchored to the ground, my nails futily scrabbled for purchase on the cement floor. Realizing what she was about to do I violently twisted my body around, growling and snapping to try and yank myself free from the invisible hands carrying me over to the hazy water now swirling less than a couple feet away.

"Guys, he's making this really hard with all that moving; I need help or I'm going to drop him before we even reach the pool," she called out in a strained voice over the snickering of the masked-boy and blond-girl.

"Wait," my human called out before walking over and wrapping me in his arms. Feeling the unseen grip she'd used to lift me dissipate, I stilled and waited to see what they would try to do next as he carefully put me down on the ground and met my stare. Normally I'd consider that a challenge to my authority, but the part of me that still seemed to recognize him as a potential mate helped to quiet the stressed out wolf instincts clawing through me.

"Wolf, I can smell how strong it is too but it would really mean a lot to the team and me if you'd get in the pool. If you do this now I promise you'll never have to do it again; I'll even stay next to you the whole time you're in there if you want."

Keeping an eye on his body language to see if he was being sincere, I took a moment to consider. Being less than three feet away from the pool, I could already feel myself getting a little light headed from the fumes emanating from the flea poison. I wasn't going to kid myself by thinking all I would have to do is stand there with my paws in the water for a few seconds. No, I was at the very least going to have to roll around in the solution and let it soak for a few minutes.

Decision time. Was I willing to do this just so I could stick with them a little longer? If I refused to go in, I'd probably have to leave; they may even try to force me so I'd have to fight my way out.

"Dude, somehow I don't think he's going to understand a word you just said. It was a nice try, but you're just going to have to grab and dump him," the redheaded devil began with a shake of his head, snapping it up in alarm at my bark of annoyance at his words. _That boy is seriously starting to piss me off,_ I thought in annoyance as I resignedly walked over to the pool and stepped in. True to his word, my silent human followed behind me after shooting a glare at the surprised boy and kneeled down with his jean-clad thighs pressed against the side of the inflated plastic.

Trying to breathe shallowly, I forced myself to lie down in preparation for rolling over, but I hesitated. In this position the water barely reached the middle of my chest, but it was close enough to my face for me to feel like I was drowning in the effect it was having on me. The skin touching the water lightly stung and the suffocating fumes felt like acid gas burning its way through my nose, eyes, and lungs. Getting dizzy and wondering if I would pass out in the water, I barely felt my human's hands soothingly rub from the top of my head and down my back before dipping into the water and lightly splash over my back; doing this several times until every inch of fur was soaked before pausing and looking up.

"Wally, how long does Wolf have to sit in this stuff for?" he asked quietly. Clearing his throat, the red head zipped over to the trash and picked up one of the containers.

"About three minutes," he read off the box. "Then he can get out and we can rinse him off. In about a month we'll have to get some sort of ointment and put it on the back of his neck to keep the fleas off in the future, but you were right; he shouldn't need to take a bath like this again. Apparently it's a lot harsher than the ointment but necessary to get rid of the initial flea infestation."

Nodding and getting out the hose, my human waited until the time was up before stepping back a few feet and waiting for me to get out.

And believe me, nothing would make me happier…..but everything was getting fuzzy and I was having a hard time holding on to a thought long enough to follow it and get out. I felt my head slowly slide a little closer down to the water and loosely wondered why it didn't seem to smell so strongly anymore. Even the burning seemed to have lessened.

"Wolf? You can get out." I heard distantly. _Well, that's nice_ , I thought pleasantly _but it's actually not that bad anymore._ What had I been so worried and uncomfortable about before? If anything being in the water made me feel numb. Like a rock. A warm rock. A wet, melty, warm rock.

I wanted to smile and laugh at the funny things fizzing in my head but I couldn't. I looked up at the worried look on my human's face and tried to tell him I was fine, but I all I did was pant and whine a little. Weird.

Oh, wait. _That's right. Not human. Wolf. I'm a wolf. I can't laugh when I look like this. What did I look like before? I can't' rem….._

The last thing I remember from that day before everything went dark was the feeling of my human's strong hands wrapping around my stomach and lifting me out of the water.

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These last three weeks had kicked some serious ass. That first night aside, I'd enjoyed every minute in my new home living with my human, the green-girl, and the boy that smelled like the ocean. I'd quickly found out that everyone on the team except sea-boy went to school, so when everyone else was gone I was left alone with him for most of the day. I quickly grew to like the dark-skinned male and his peaceable manner as we played on the beach or I napped on the floor during his meditations. I got the impression he was glad for the company, and had to wonder how lonely he must have been before I'd arrived. The poor guy was left completely alone for the better part of five days a week on an isolated mountain with only the occasional visitor from their parent group of adult heroes as they stopped by to check in.

Hanging around him was entertaining though, and I was intrigued by the scent of the wild unique to marine life that he carried with him. In the mornings after my human had left we'd go down to the beach and he'd manipulate water from the ocean into different shapes for me to chase or play fight with me until it was time for lunch. After eating he would sit and meditate for a few hours while I dozed off under the warmth of the sun shining through the window until he was done and we could move on to a different activity.

Overall I was living a pretty sweet life and immensely enjoying the company of my new friend, but deep down there was always a small part of me that wished I was spending the time with my human instead. The second he came home I couldn't stop the rush of excitement and joy over his return that had me running to his side and refusing to leave like a stubbornly attached puppy until he had to leave for school again the next morning.

I have to admit that the human in me couldn't help but be a little smug when my presence seemed to interrupt the time he spent with the Martian green-girl. I was still working through my feelings for him and exactly what I wanted to do about it, but my territorial instincts had me feeling a petty rush of victorious vindictiveness whenever I smelled the disappointment the green-girl now exuded every time she saw me by his side.

I might have started feeling bad about it but my human gave zero indication of minding the interruption when they were alone together. I tried not to look too much into the meaning of it in case I was just pushing my own feelings on to him, but on occasion I thought I could even detect a faint hint of relief when he saw me coming in to intrude on whatever they'd been doing at the time.

From the way the she watched him when she thought he wasn't looking though, it was clear she viewed him as a mate. And though it wasn't as obvious for him, I figured he saw her as a mate as well – or at least as a potential one if the way he let her hang around him so much was any indication. It tugged at my wolf's instincts uncomfortably every time I saw them together, but it was easy to console myself when I remembered that I saw him naked more often than she did; if she ever even had to begin with.

Did you hear me right? Yes. Completely and gloriously naked.

Much to my pleasure I found out my human was fond of sleeping in the nude and did so almost every night. I think he may have felt slightly awkward about it the first night or two I slept in his room because he wore black pajama pants to bed, but seemed to get over any hang-ups pretty quickly. While my wolf was just happy to know he felt comfortable around me to sleep in such a vulnerable state, my human side couldn't help but feel delighted that strength and looks were not the only impressive things about him.

As the days turned to weeks and I spent more time around the interesting group of young heroes surrounding my human I found myself wanting more and more to become human again myself. After the flea treatment debacle I hadn't been subjected to any of the blood tests or examinations underwear-man wanted from me but I knew it was only a matter of time. If I wanted to reveal my secret to the others myself I'd have to do it soon, before their guilt over my flea-bath wore off and they found out from any medical tests they would perform on me.

It was about four days ago when I first attempted the transformation. Sea-boy had left to go visit his home in the ocean and the others were all in school, giving me the perfect opportunity to see if I could still be human without fear of being discovered by anyone else. I'd gone into my human's bathroom to see myself in the mirror and took a moment to study myself for the first time since arriving to the mountain. It felt enlightening to see myself so clearly; the reflections I'd seen in water back in India hadn't let me see as plainly as I could in front of a well-lit mirror. Looking straight ahead, I observed a tall wolf with gold on grey eyes staring back at me curiously. I was covered in blindingly white fur with a long, bushy tail and had some heavy scarring down the insides of my legs, but otherwise was rather impressive looking if I did say so myself.

Sitting down and closing my eyes, I breathed evenly to calm myself and tried to remember what I looked like as a human being. I remember being slightly above average in height at almost five feet and nine inches tall. I remembered having blue eyes too, but I couldn't recall what shade they were. I had curly hair, but the knowledge of what color and length it was remained frustratingly out of reach. Every time I tried to think of specific things like colors or the shape and size of my body I just started thinking of what I looked like as a wolf.

I stayed there for nearly an hour just trying to remember what I used to look like and the effort started to pay off as my memories started becoming a little sharper.

I was blond. I had curly blond hair that was long enough to reach just past my shoulders, but it'd almost always been up in a ponytail or braid. I remember sporting a pretty serious farmer's tan on my arms, and I had a couple scars on my stomach and left shoulder from an animal attack when I was younger – but l didn't know which animal had given them to me or how old they were. Sighing, I opened my eyes and rolled my neck back to stretch out any kinks from staying still for so long.

Now that I had a better image of what I might look like in my head, I stood up and focused on my paws. The transformation had always started there when I'd wanted to become human in the past. I concentrated and flexed them a little, feeling the heavy weight of my body shift and balance over the rough black pads protecting them. I could hear the soft scrape of my nails against the cool white tiles beneath them and imagined it was my short human fingernails instead.

As soon as I felt a pins and needles sensation shoot through my paws I knew I was successful. Moving into a half-crouch, I embraced the ripple running down my spine and steadied myself as I felt the first painful shifting of bone and muscle under my skin. Groaning in a distorted voice that was half wolf and half human, I fell down on my side after a particularly painful shift in my face that snapped my jaw and smoothed down my snout until it was the rounder shape of a human face.

The entire process was terrifyingly quick and efficient, with my body simply reabsorbing any extra tissue or bone back into itself in under a minute. By the end of it any outward trace of my wolf had disappeared, leaving a panting human girl behind in its place.

My arms and legs were still pretty shaky, so it took several attempts before I could pull myself up on the edge of the counter and lean forward to keep most of my weight off my feet. I'd always had a hard time readjusting to walking on two feet in the past and figured that being wolf for almost a year and half wouldn't exactly help in that regard.

Lifting my head I watched my human lips part in a soft gasp as I looked at the face in the mirror. The color and shape of my hair was exactly as I remembered, and I couldn't help reaching a trembling hand up to take a lock and rub it between my fingers. I distantly found myself wondering how it had managed to grow so much when I'd been a wolf most of the time, but pushed the thought away as I leaned forward to look at my eyes. My face fell in disappointment at the amber eyes glittering back at me, but at least the grey surrounding them had lightened considerably. From far away people might not even be able to notice that they weren't quite white.

Shifting back, I gingerly let more of my weight center over my feet and slowly took a precarious step back from the counter until I was standing without the support of something to lean on. My legs were still painfully wobbly and I kept having to move my arms around to stay balanced, but it let me see what the rest of my body looked like.

I couldn't absorb clothing, so whenever I'd become human in the past it was always completely naked. This time was no different, but I found myself wishing it was. In addition to the scars I used to have my skin was now littered in fresh reminders of the last two years. I could see every encounter with a hunter, every fight for dominance with another wolf, every experiment and torture I'd suffered under the care of the brain-machine. Hearing a quiet splash of liquid hit the floor, I glanced up and saw tears silently trailing down from the wide and haunted eyes of the girl standing in front of me.

I didn't recognize this person. She was older and curvier than I was, with fuller breasts and longer hair. She stared at me sadly with gold eyes instead of my own blue, and she was covered in more scars than I'd even known it was possible to have. Hesitantly twisting her torso around, I barely managed to look at her back in the mirror with toppling over but managed to steady my balance. There were more scars there, but under that I saw the detailed black ink outlining a long cluster of roses curling over my shoulder blades and down my spine. My lips lifted into a ghost of a smile and a sigh of relief echoed softly in the room.

It was one of the last links I had left of my past, and a part of me had been afraid that it wouldn't be on this stranger's body. I couldn't remember when or why I'd imprinted the tattoo on my skin, but I knew it had happened before my first transformation into a wolf and was important to me.

I stood in front of the mirror for what must have been hours in a trance as I reacquainted myself with my human body, and it was only the sound of someone entering the base that jerked me out of it.

I immediately recognized the sound of my human's footsteps moving through the common area and the light sound of his backpack hitting the floor.

"Wolf? Are you there?" He called out in hesitantly. I could imagine the cute crinkle appearing on his forehead as he paced around and looked for me. Since the day I'd arrived he'd come to expect me at the door waiting for him after school, and while it warmed me to know he'd immediately noticed my absence I knew it meant I wouldn't have much time to change back before he came looking for me in our room.

Pushing down the panic bubbling in my chest, I dropped down to the floor and braced myself for the change back to my wolf form. Focusing on my face this time, I concentrated for a moment before I could feel the sharp ache in my gums signifying the start of my shift. I held back a whimper as my jaw cracked and elongated while my skin prickled unpleasantly from the fur sprouting out of it. I heard the heavy steps of my human come down the hall and willed the change to go faster as a heavy pressure at the base of my spine signified the emergence of my tail.

The door to the room opened and I barely managed to roll over onto my paws and stagger out of the bathroom in time to meet him at the foot of the bed. Tilting his head to the side curiously, my human's forehead relaxed of worried wrinkles and he smiled at me in relief.

"You had me worried for a minute there, Wolf. Did you accidentally get locked in the room?" He asked amusedly. Too tired to do much else, I tilted my head and blinked at him innocently. Rolling his eyes, he stepped forward and wrapped his arms around me, burying his face into my neck and sighing.

It wasn't something he ever let the others see, but my human was surprisingly affectionate when no one else was around. Like clockwork, every time we were left alone he'd immediately wrap an arm around me or cuddle into my side only to move away whenever a member of the team or one of their adult mentors came by.

Wolves are very affectionate creatures as a general rule and the desire to be physically close to the ones you care about had carried over to me, so on a personal level I loved seeing that affectionate side of him come out. As a fellow alpha however, I understood the instinct to maintain an aloof and weakness-free image in front of the others, even if they _were_ friends. In both of the packs I'd led in India I'd had to maintain a certain level of emotional distance from the other wolves or I would have been constantly bombarded with challenges to my authority. It was an unfair fact, but showing too much affection for them was viewed as a sign of weakness.

Closing my eyes, I relaxed into my human's embrace and found myself wishing I was able to wrap my own arms around him. His sudden arrival home had made me panic and change back into a wolf, but with no one else here it would have been the perfect opportunity to reveal myself.

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The next morning I woke up to the sound of a quiet pinging noise coming from the intercom by the door. Blearily, I lifted my head and looked over at the naked man curled against my side and waited for him to get up and put an end to the annoying sound so I could get back to sleep, but he just continued to snore. Huffing in irritation, I twisted my head until I could stare right at his face and opened my mouth wide in a yawn before bringing my snout close enough to lick him. Almost immediately I heard his heart rate and breathing change as he woke up and moved his head away to escape the tongue bath. Blue eyes opened to lazily glare at me as the arm wrapped around my side was taken away to wipe the spit off his face. Glancing at the still pinging box by the door, he sighed and got out of the bed to shuffle over to the wall and with more force than necessary poked a red button at the top.

"What?" He asked gruffly. A chuckle of amusement came out of the speaker before the voice of masked-boy on the other end answered.

"Sounds like I woke you up. Sorry man, but Batman sent me ahead to let you know we've got an important mission coming in and we're gonna need all hands on deck for it."

"Fine. We'll be there in fifteen minutes."

"Better make it ten, it's time sensitive." I could practically hear the smirk in his next words. "Wolf, can you get him down here quickly please?"

Ignoring the offended look sent my way, I barked an affirmative.

"Cool, see you guys in the mission room."

My human scowled at the intercom and roughly pressed the red button to end the call. Hearing the white plastic creak in protest, I watched him in amusement as he stomped over to the dresser and grabbed a clean black shirt before bending over to grab his jeans from the floor. I waited until he finished dressing before getting out of the bed and crossed the floor to reach the door. Following our usual morning routine, he opened it to let me out before closing it again and heading to the bathroom. Jogging over to the elevator, I lifted my paw and pressed the button to go down. Luckily it opened immediately and I pressed another button inside that would send me down to the ground floor, leading directly outside so I could take care of my own business.

After I was done I reentered the elevator and used it to go back to our room. I could hear him brushing his teeth and decided to wait in the hall for him while he finished up. Figuring we had about two minutes left of our ten minute deadline I barked at the door and listened to the usual grumbling about pushy dogs until he opened the door and followed me back down the elevator.

Walking out briskly, I almost ran into green-girl. It was obvious she'd been waiting outside the elevator, and with a soft smile she greeted my human delightedly. Still feeling a little grumpy about his interrupted sleep, he briefly acknowledged her and walked next to me until we'd reached the mission room where masked-boy and sea-boy were dressed casually in jackets and jeans while sparring. As we approached they took a break and started chatting.

"Heh. You know they're a couple, right?" Masked-boy whispered to his companion.

Glancing between my human and the painfully attentive girl next to him, the sea-dweller nodded and smiled. "I believe I knew before they did." 

Subtly gesturing towards the redhead and blond making their way down the hall, the shorter boy said something else but it was drowned out by the sound of my human's annoyed sigh. Feeling regretful, I pressed against him sympathetically after remembering I wasn't the only one with a heightened sense of hearing. He probably didn't enjoy being gossiped about, regardless of whether the information was true or not.

Entering the room, fast-boy stopped and dramatically crossed his arms as he took a quick look around, his gaze narrowing as it lingered on the man-child eating breakfast and an unfamiliar man dressed in a tuxedo standing off to the side.

"So. If Zatara is our babysitter of the week, why's _he_ still here? And why is he eating my snacks?!" He asked indignantly, frowning at the man-child as he blithely chewed on a protein bar.

"Recognized: Batman zero-two" the computerized voice of a woman suddenly announced, keeping any one from replying. A blue portal appeared in the corner and underwear-man strode in smelling heavily of apprehension and stress. Without delay he immediately turned towards the center of the room and called out his instructions.

"Computer, national news."

Staring in fascination, I watched as a holographic screen appeared out of thin air and turned to a local news channel. Gravely looking into the camera, a blond woman with grey eyes and a high pitched voice spoke.

"-the initial attack was short-lived, but Metropolis was only granted a short reprieve." The camera switched to birds-eye view and revealed what appeared to be the giant vines of a plant thrashing around and damaging entire buildings across the city.

I could smell fear and anxiety rolling off the people around me as we all watched one of the vines completely crushed a building like a rowdy kid toppling a sandcastle. Terrified people that'd been standing on the roof of the collapsing building were whisked to safety by a man dressed all in blue spandex and red underwear as he flew out of view of the camera.

"Despite the intervention of Superman and the Justice League, there seems to be no end in sight." The woman finished worriedly.

"Should we get out there?" Someone asked.

"No. The League will soon have the situation under control; that's not why I'm here." The dark-man replied in a firm voice. "According to your Intel, Sportsmaster supplied Cadmus' blockbuster formula to Kobra–"

" –Who combined it with Bane's venom to create Kobra venom," Fast-boy continued.

"Which the Brain then used to create his animal army," masked-boy finished in agreement. I couldn't see his eyes behind the shades he wore on his face, but I could feel his gaze join the rest of the group in their quick glances towards me at the mention of the drug responsible for the mutations I and countless others had been subjected to. Either unaware or uncaring of his teammates pointed stares, my human smiled good-naturedly and gave the fur on my neck a quick scratch.

"And upgrade wolf," He chimed in confidently. I wanted to bite him in the ass for that comment, but figured it wouldn't look good at this particular point in time.

Still, though. Once I turned human again we were going to have a conversation about our differences in opinion on how being physically and mentally tortured for months by a sociopathic robot with a French accent counts as getting "upgraded". Huffing in irritation, I resisted the urge to move away from my stupid human and stayed still to listen as they continued to talk about my ex-kidnapper.

"The brain also used upgraded versions of the inhibitor collars of the ones at the penitentiary." Green-girl recalled, watching the light-hearted expression on my humans' face hungrily as he continued to pet me. Smelling a small spike in the scent of desperation she carried around with her, I glanced at her curiously and wondered what she wanted. To see more of the expression on my human's face? Or maybe she just wanted him to pay attention to her instead?

"Batman, is it possible that plant thing's on Kobra venom too?" blond-girl asked curiously.

"I had Green Lantern run a spot analysis," he replied, moving his hand to flip through the images on the screen before stopping on some diagrams.

"And divine cellulose _does_ contain trace amounts of a Kobra venom variant."

Looking pensive, sea-boy spoke up as well. "These cannot be coincidences; unrelated criminals are cooperating with one another worldwide."

"Exactly. It's now clear our enemies have formed some kind of secret society of super villains; the attack on Metropolis is only the beginning." Underwear-man responded.

It was at this point that I zoned out. Believe me, I totally understood that this was a serious matter and lives were at stake, but it wasn't like I could do anything about it except maybe try to pee on the vines. It would take a week or two to work, but if I drank a lot of water I'm sure I could kill off one or two of them.

I was also having a hell of a time trying to take the underwear-man seriously when he was still wearing that ridiculous getup and saying things like _oh yeah guys, there's a secret society of supervillains waiting to gang up on us. That's right, you heard me. They're not just a club of socially retarded people with too much time on their hands, they're "secret" SUPER villains that like to play with GMO plants in their off time._

Yeah, underwear-man, we get it. The world is being held hostage by mutated vegetables with a resistance to weed-killer.

I was debating whether or not to take my afternoon nap a little early when the sound of static coming from the screen caught my attention. When the static stopped, a pale man in a purple suit with green hair appeared on the screen. Looking like a wannabe pimp, he knocked on the screen a couple times and smiled before taking a knife out of his pocket.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we interrupt your regularly scheduled mayhem to bring you this important announcement from the _In_ justice League!" Chuckling darkly, he grabbed the camera filming him and panned it around to face a group of colorfully dressed people.

An older man speaking in a thick accent I didn't recognize began to speak.

"We are responsible for the attacks on your cities. If you wish to save them, a ransom of ten billion American dollars is required. Delivery instructions have been sent to the United Nations and there is no time limit, but the longer your governments wait…"

"The more we get to have our jollies!" the pimp-man finished with relish. He cackled until the screen cut out and turned to static again. Turning away from the screen, underwear-man put a hand to his ear and seemed to be listening to someone.

"Roger that, Aquaman. The UN will prepare the ransom as a fallback, but it won't come to that," he promised. Tapping away on a holographic keyboard, masked-boy brought the video back up and rewound until a paused image of the weirdoes hovered on the screen above.

"Count Vertigo, the Joker, Poison Ivy, Ultra-Humanite, Atomic Skull, Black Adam, and Wotan. _Seven_ heavy hitters and probably behind everyone and everything we've faced so far." Masked-boy commented with an air of vague disbelief.

"There's your secret society," Fast-boy replied solemnly.

Next to him, blond-girl shook her head. "Not exactly secret anymore are they?"

"Perhaps after India they realized we would deduce the truth and saw no point in hiding any longer?" sea-boy proposed with a hint of doubt in his voice.

"Yeah, that was their mistake. Right now I say we go kick some plant creature ass!" the redhead decided more optimistically.

Reentering the conversation, underwear-man held up his hand and halted that thought.

"The Justice League will handle the plants; I have a different job for this team."

"Aw, man." Fast-boy replied, the disappointment on his face turning into a grimace when the blond next to him jabbed her elbow into his unsuspecting stomach.

Ignoring the exchange, the older man gestured to the screen above them. Pictures of different cities from around the world being destroyed by the plants hovered on the display.

"With the plants attacking so many locations simultaneously, there must be a central control system.  
Your mission is to destroy it."

Breaking his silence, the tuxedoed man from earlier stepped forward smelling of worry.

"You realize what you're really asking them to do?"

"They're ready."

Looking between the two as if they were having a tennis match, the redhead interrupted again.

"Um. Ready? Ready for what?" He asked before getting hit in the stomach again.

"Ow! Will you cut that out?!"

" _Hello_ , Wally! If the big guns are fighting the plants, who do you think _we'll_ be fighting?" The blond archer asked with a look on her face that showed she clearly thought the speedster was an idiot.

"I don't know, I guess we'll – Oh." He responded, finally getting it.

Looking unconvinced, tuxedo-man acquiesced. "Well Batman, I trust you're correct."

"I trust _you_ can locate the enemy." He replied smartly.

"Indeed. Wotan's informants suggest sorcery is part of how the plants are controlled. Robin, if you will provide a holo-map I'll search for signs of concentrated sorcerous activity."

Nodding, the raven-haired boy's fingers flew over the keyboard and a large holographic projection of Earth appeared in front of him.

Raising his arms, tuxedo-man chanted in a foreign language before pointing to a red dot that now hovered over the southeastern United States. "There. That is where you will find the Injustice League's central control system."

Nodding, masked-boy tapped a couple keys and looked up. "Coordinates are now locked in on the Louisiana bayou."

With a sharp nod sea-boy turned towards the adult heroes in front of us and officially accepted the mission.

"We are on our way."

In an eerily synchronized motion the entire team turned and ran back down the hall towards the locker rooms to change and get ready. Jogging lightly with them, I waited outside with my human for the others to finish up. I was impressed at their speed when everyone gathered outside and was heading down to the garage less than two minutes later.

Once we'd arrived I sat down and sighed while they boarded the red ship, wondering if I should go hunting around the beach before my nap. I was in the mood for a snack and the exercise would help keep my mind off of the danger my human might be putting himself in. As the ship's door began to close, my human poked his head back out and looked down at me expectantly.

Was I not supposed to be here? I got up to turn and leave when I was stopped by the sound of his voice.

"Uh, Wolf? You coming?" He asked quizzically.

Oh. Good question. Probably should have expected that might be a possibility.

 _Hell yes!_ I barked back excitedly. As if he understood exactly what I'd said, he grinned and waited while I ran over to the reopening door of the ship. I slipped into a moment of déjà vu as my paws skidded on the metal and I violently tripped forward on a collision course with him. Looking like he half-expected this, he had his arms out and ready to catch me as I slammed into him hard enough that it would have knocked over and cracked the bones of a normal human being. Hearing the muffled chuckle coming from the face pressed into my neck, I was relieved to see he was fine.

"Superboy you can play with Wolf later. We really need to get going and I can't have the bioship take off if you're not buckled into your seat," Green-girl firmly reminded from the pilot's chair. Feeling his arms drop, I huffed and followed him to his seat in the back. Ignoring the amused smirks coming from the rest of the team, I set my head on his lap and enjoyed a moment of bliss while he absentmindedly scratched behind my ears. Once the ship was in the air and flying south the team quickly worked together to figure out how they were going to confront the enemy.

The plan was pretty simple and didn't take long to put together. Personally I thought it lacked any finesse or subtlety, but as the masked-boy pointed out…..

"These villains have even given members of the Justice League trouble and we can't afford the time it would take to get in there with the element of surprise. I wouldn't be surprised if they had systems in place to detect us long before we'd even arrive so we're going to have to take a more direct approach."

"And exactly how are we supposed to that? If it were all of us against one or two of them maybe we'd have a chance of beating those guys in direct combat, but there's seven of them and only six of– "

 _Growl._

"– Jesus, Wolf take a chill pill; _seven_ of us. It's barely going to be one on one!" blond-girl exclaimed with an annoyed toss of her hair. Nodding in silent agreement, green-girl kept her eyes on the terrain sweeping by the ship pensively. Sighing, fast-boy leaned his head back and closed his eyes.

"Honestly we just don't have enough information at this point to try making a more sophisticated plan. Once we get there and know more we can figure out the details, but until then we'll keep it simple." Opening his eyes, he glanced at sea-boy and raised an eyebrow in question. Seeing this, the quiet leader of the group confirmed the assessment.

"Kid Flash is correct. Our priority is destroying the device responsible for the enemy's control over the plants wrecking the cities. We will try to subdue and capture members of the Injustice League should we encounter them, however it is a secondary objective. When we arrive Miss. Martian and Robin will use stealth to enter the building and locate the controller. Once we receive confirmation that the device has been found Artemis and I will follow in as backup while Superboy, Wolf, and Kid Flash maintain a perimeter watch."

"Sounds good. By the way, what's in the duffel?" the redhead asked suddenly, pointing to a canvas bag sitting on the floor. I'd been curious about this myself, as it had some seriously freaky scents wafting off of whatever was in there. Giving it a quick glance, sea-boy shifted slightly in discomfort and pensively replied.

"Plan B."

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Smelling a surge of adrenaline from green-girl, I looked up in time to see her clutch her head in discomfort and make a noise of distress. Looking up in concern, my human asked if she was alright.

"Dizzy," Was all she replied back.

"Martians get airsick?" masked boy asked in amusement.

"She does look a bit greener than usual." Fast-boy commented.

"Not me, _her_." She retorted, rolling her eyes in perfect imitation of the sarcastic archer next to her.

Flabbergasted, said blond looked at the others, mirroring their confusion.

"Um, I feel fine."

"No, not _her_ ; the bioship. She's trying to shield us, but –"

Grimacing in pain she hunched over and groaned. Before she could continue we all heard the sound of something heavy being slammed against the side and we flew into a barrel roll. I would have been tossed like a salad and gotten pretty banged up if my human hadn't thrown his arm around my side and tugged me close with an almost bruising strength. For a few terrifying seconds my howl joined the team's screams as we hurtled toward the water below us.

With a thunderous splash we crashed in to the swamp below and immediately began sinking as large vines like the ones I'd seen destroying the cities wrapped themselves around the ship and pulled us under. Hearing the sound of crunching metal I looked up to see one of the dark haired men from the video ripping open a hole in the ceiling. Screaming in pain as if _she_ were the one being ripped apart, the Martian held her head in agony.

"He's hurting her!" She cried out, prompting my human to rip off his seatbelt and jump up to our intruder. Slamming his fist into the man's face, he quickly fell back down in surprise as a waterfall of murky water began pouring in from the whole.

"No!" blond-girl exclaimed angrily. "No way am I nearly drowning three missions in a row!" Shoving her hand into the bag strapped to her shoulder, she brought out a couple black devices and handed one over to a surprised looking fast-boy before biting down on her own.

"Wow. Uh, thanks." He replied before following suit and putting it in his mouth.

Feeling overwhelmed from the intense odor of anxiety clouding the air and all the ways I'd nearly died in the last four minutes alone, I missed the garbled exchange between the others and just felt alarm when green-girl smacked herself in head and opened a hole at the bottom of the ship.

 _Oh my god, she's trying to kill us all_ I thought in horror as more water flooded the ship. I barely had time to choke down one last breath of air before we were completely submerged in the murky water.

It was a terrifying experience, holding my breath as a wolf; I'd never had to do it like this before. All I'd ever really done was paddle across a lake or river in India, and even then I'd never dunked my head or tried diving. As my canine instincts threatened to send me in a panic and drown, I came to the conclusion that's there's a reason dogs generally don't try to swim underwater.

The relief I felt when I realized everyone was swimming through the hole to escape was short lived when I found myself having a hard time following them. My body kept drifting upwards and I couldn't seem to get enough momentum to sink deep enough that I could reach the hole. A short burst of bubbles escaped my burning lungs as I paddled furiously, but I couldn't seem make any progress no matter how many times I tried to make it.

Barely holding on to the last vestiges of oxygen in me, I tried propelling off of one of the seats and gave one last furious dive for freedom. Wanting to cry in relief, I finally reached the edges of the hole and hooked my paws around the edge to push off against the sinking ship and swim upwards. Breaking through to the surface, I gulped in several lung fulls of air and looked around until I spotted the rest of the team a couple of yards away and paddled until I caught up to them as they dragged themselves on to a patch of dry land.

Everyone seemed to be as winded as I was if their gasping and heavy breathing was anything to go by. The green-girl stood up and looked around until she pointed at the barely visible top of the ship we'd just escaped.

"She's in shock," she told the group. "She'll need time to recover."

 _No duh_ , I wanted say. We _all_ needed time to recover. I was considering whether or not to shake myself off next to her when I heard the soft footfalls of several people heading our way. All I managed to get out was a growl of warning before we were all knocked down by a sound so piercing it seemed to create a shockwave.

"Vertigo!" fast-boy called out angrily.

"Count Vertigo to _you_ , peasant." An older man in sophisticated clothes and a green cape replied back derisively. My human shot forward, pulling his arm back to punch him but was intercepted by the fancy-man's companion and got knocked back. Seeing this, sea-boy jumped up and summoned water from the swamp we'd just escaped. Thrusting it forward, he slammed the water into the cloaked man, pushing him back violently into a small cluster of trees. Using the confusion to their advantage, green-girl and masked-boy ran off in to the direction of the controller; leaving the rest of us to fight off the enemy.

The water-wielder looked back over his shoulder just in time to be punched by the second man attacking us. I recognized him as the one that had tried to rip a hole in the ship earlier and decided he would be a good target to take out my rage over nearly drowning. Leaping forward, I tackled him with precision and snapped my jaws around his neck. On a normal human I would have ripped his throat out, but this man had the same tough skin as my human and I was barely able to even pierce the skin before being thrown several feet back into the water.

Just as I was getting back up to attack again the bodies of two others slammed into me, shoving my head back under water. Choking on the gritty liquid, I wasn't able to avoid the onslaught of punches strong-man delivered to my side before he was tackled by a speeding blur. While they were busy I tried to make my way back out of the water as quickly as possible but the beating I'd gotten had broken a couple of ribs and was making it too painful to move very fast.

By the time I got to shore only sea-boy and my human were still conscious and fighting, while the others were all lying on the ground unconscious. The cloaked man from earlier had rejoined the fight and was directing another shockwave of sound in conjunction with his teammates brutal attacks. I barely had the energy left to keep standing let alone fight, but after witnessing a particularly vicious kick to my human's head that knocked him out cold I knew I didn't have much of a choice. While they were busy with the quickly overwhelmed leader of our group I thought through my options and made an attack plan.

I knew I wouldn't be able to do much against the strong one but figured I might at least be able to take the fancy-man down with me. Growling, I shoved down the pain and gathered the last of my strength for one last do-or-die attack. I launched myself at the my target's back and landed on top of him, immediately clamping down on his shoulder and tearing through skin and muscle with relish. Ignoring the guttural screams of agony in my ear, I twisted my head back forth and crushed through his collarbone until I heard his voice gurgle with the sound of blood. Hearing heavy steps rushing behind me, I clamped down even harder and jerked my head back when I felt crushing arms lift me off my victim.

Fancy-man must have passed out from the pain, because he didn't make a single sound as I tore out a large chunk of flesh and spit it back into the ground with a wet thud. With a glare, strong-man dropped me on the ground and brought his fist back in preparation for a punch, almost as if in slow motion. Before his fist connected and everything went black I took in the sight of my unconscious human and distantly found myself wishing I'd let myself meet him as a human when I'd had the chance.

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It was too dark to see anything, but I could feel a pleasant wind rustling my fur. It smelled nice too, like I'd stuck my head in a cloud and could sniff out the beginnings of a thunderstorm. Being dead wasn't all that bad if staying in this strangely peaceful darkness was the tradeoff.

I could vaguely feel something tugging at the edge of my consciousness, but it kept slipping away the more I tried to follow it. Mentally shrugging when several attempts to remember whatever it was that was bugging me had failed, I relaxed back into the cool blackness around me and inhaled deeply to breathe in more of the refreshing air around me, but something was off. I could feel my face scrunch up in a frown when my thunderstorm began to take on a metallic tint. Almost like….blood?

Unfortunately that was a scent I knew all too well. An avalanche of memories and sensations from the recent battle slammed into me and I felt painfully disoriented for a moment as my head pounded in time with my heart beat viciously.

On the bright side, if the screaming agony in my head and ribs was any indication, I was in fact _not_ dead.

Keeping my eyes closed in case the enemy was watching me, I struggled to find any sign that I wasn't alone, wherever I was. If they were willing to keep me alive even after killing a member of their group then maybe they'd left the others alive too; even if for what I suspected were frightening reasons. Before I could hear or smell anything though, I felt a ripple down my spine and the tell-tale pins and needles sensation in my paws signifying an impending change from wolf to human.

Jerking in alarm at the sensation, I almost doubled over from the pain the movement aggravated in my ribs. Doing my best to ignore the discomfort, I focused on the image of what I looked like as a wolf to keep me grounded in my canine form until the urge to shift started to fade.

Where the hell had _that_ come from? I'd been through things a thousand times worse than a couple of broken ribs or a concussion and my body had never tried to force a change then. If I managed to get out of this situation alive I'd need to investigate why this was happening, but until then I had to keep myself focused on staying wolf if I wanted to keep my secret. Thankfully the initial signs of an immediate change happening had dissipated, but I could still feel an underlying pressure wrapping itself around my bones and squeezing as if to let me know that I wouldn't be able to hold it off for long.

I tried to sniff out the scents of the others, but between the wind and the blood caking my nose I couldn't smell any hint of the others. Giving up on trying to pretend I was still unconscious when my movement earlier had probably already given me away, I slowly opened my eyes only to find myself looking into the bleary gaze of my human.

I watched while he slowly blinked a couple times as if just waking up himself; it only took a few seconds before his eyes focused on the blood matting fur and he stiffened in surprise. Ignoring my red splattered face, he brought his hand up and brushed his fingers through the fur along my body; pausing in worry at the muffled whine I let out when he pressed against my side too hard. Sitting up, he glanced around until he found the prone form of whoever was passed out next to him.

Trusting he had the task of waking the others handled, I lifted my head a little and saw we were in a large golden cage soaring through the air, heading in the direction of a strange glass dome. It was as tall as a skyscraper and looked to be some kind of greenhouse if the large vines bursting from the top were any indication.

Flying next to us was an intimidating man in red on gold spandex and a black cape. His hair was pitch black and spiked up on either side of his head, looking eerily similar to the pointed cat ears underwear-man sported on his mask. His skin was so pale it had the frightening grey pallor of a corpse, and I could easily see the veins crisscrossing underneath.

It was his eyes that disturbed me the most though.

The whites were completely blacked out the same way mine were after brain-machine forced my body to mutate, but instead of sporting gold irises his eyes were a disturbing blood-red color. In their depths was the hint of an ancient exhaustion that made me think of some of the captive animals back in India.

Sometimes when the brain-machine was bored or ran out of ideas for experimentation he would torture animals he deemed expendable, to keep his mind "fresh". He'd push them to their breaking point over and over again until they were physically incapable of taking any more pain. Eventually they would all take on the look this man had, of brokenly wanting to die but knowing it would only ever happen on someone else's whims.

Glancing down at me, the ancient-one smiled and flashed unnaturally white teeth in a feral grin that worked hard to hide the long wished for end to whatever misery he was experiencing.

"Ah, I see you awaken. You did quite a number on our dear Count. Why, if I hadn't arrived when I did I doubt he would have survived his encounter with you." Chuckling, he watched in amusement as my human grabbed two of the bars of our cage and tried to pull apart them apart with a grunt. When they didn't even budge the grey-man shook his head amicably and winked at me, acting like the two of us were enjoying a private joke the others weren't in on.

He gestured toward our cage theatrically. "As you can see, the cage is impenetrable. Even the all-powerful Superboy has no chance of escaping."

An inhuman growl sounded nearby, and someone else decided to try breaking through the gold prison. "You are not the only one trained in the mystic arts, Wotan!" Sea-boy called out angrily. The tattoos covering his body went from their dormant black to a bright blue color before fading back again when electricity crackled around the sea-dweller painfully and he let out a hoarse yell of pain.

"Please, Atlantean; do not pretend you're in my League. With the power at my command I could kill you with barely a thought and not lose any sleep over it." Glancing back towards me slyly, he curved his mouth back into the savage smile from earlier.

"Well, except for _you_ of course. A dear friend of mine would love to have his lost puppy returned to him, and after watching you in action myself I can see why he would want his beautiful loupe back at his side where she belongs."

Snarling back, I had half a mind to try destroying the cage myself if it meant I could reach him. I knew who he was talking about, and it terrified me to know the brain-machine might be looking for me. He opened his mouth and would have continued speaking but wasn't able to get even one word out before a bright red ship smashed into him at high speed and sent the turd flying into the water below.

Sweet karma was in the mood to bitch slap someone today, and _I_ certainly wasn't going to complain about who she'd chosen. Unfortunately the cage holding us disappeared as soon as the miraculously repaired ship made contact with the ancient one and we quickly followed behind him into the water below. Luckily we weren't more than ten of fifteen feet from the water and the fall wouldn't kill us, but we definitely wouldn't land without a few bumps and bruises to show for it.

I had no idea where he'd come from, but swooping in behind us was the strong-man from earlier with the bloody and unconscious form of fancy-man hanging limply in his arms. Instead of chasing us however, he just flew to glass dome ahead of us and disappeared into the opening at the top.

Bracing myself for an inevitably unpleasant impact, I was startled when my human caught me bridal-style in the air and hit the water feet first before dragging us both to the safety of land. The landing still jarred my ribs, but didn't hurt nearly as bad as it would have if I'd landed in the water myself. Feeling a surge of warmth and gratitude, I gave his cheek a quick lick before getting down and preparing myself to fight off whatever came for us next.

We didn't have to wait long before a white gorilla with a gun slung in its hands came barreling towards us. Not the same creature as gorilla-man, but she carried herself similarly and lacked any scent of the wild. I heard the sound of another enemy coming up behind us, but one glance at the determined faces of our teammates and I knew they had it covered.

Scowling, my human obviously knew who he wanted to fight.

"I hate monkeys." He muttered, and charged forward. Following behind him, I kept an ear out for our companions as we fought our attackers.

Blond-girl made a frustrated noise and I figured she must have discovered the loss of her weapons. "I feel naked, and not in a fun way," she complained to the Atlantean next to her.

"We will make our own fun as we have been trained. Maneuver 7!"He called back; either not getting the innuendo or willfully pretending he'd misunderstood.

Figuring they had things in hand, I focused more intensely on dodging the bullets being shot at me and barreled forward toward the gorilla-woman as fast as my injuries would allow me. I couldn't leap up and go straight for a killing blow, but I _was_ able to get in several bites and gashes along her torso and arms to compensate. While she was distracted with me my human was able to come in from behind and knock her out with a solid kick to the back of her head. Once she was down I moved forward to finish her off when a loud explosion from the glass dome blew up the giant vines creeping out the top.

The pained scream of a red haired woman wrapped in vines and green spandex caught my attention and I watched as she staggered towards the smoking remains of the vines. "My baby!" She gasped out with a horrified sob before giving an enraged shriek and summoned more vines to attack a smug looking Martian and masked boy as they appeared out of the wreckage. Before the plants could even reach them however, the Martian lifted her arms and pushed out her powers to disintegrate them.

Walking towards the battle from the direction of the destroyed dome, the pimp-man from the video walked up to the scene with his hands on his hips.

"Children. _Children_ foiled our plan?! Inconceivable. Unacceptable. _Retributionable!_ " He yelled out angrily. Pausing, he seemed to ponder something for a moment before facing us and cupping a hand to the side of his face in a sudden 180, dramatically whispering to the group as if he were sharing a dirty little secret.

"So…..that last one might not have been a word." Shrugging, he smiled so widely it had to hurt his cheeks. "So sue me." He cackled after an awkward pause when it was obvious nobody really knew what to say. He must have recognized the interruption to the fighting he'd caused, because he pumped his arms up into the air exuberantly and encouraged his comrades to keep going.

"Kill them. Kill them all!" He cried out gleefully.

Now, maybe it was from how stretched thin I felt between fighting and having to resist the urge to become human, or it could have been from how hilariously uncomfortable he was making both his own allies and the team fighting them, but for some reason I really liked this guy. He was obviously insane, or at least doing a decent job of acting like it, but he was strangely entertaining to watch even if he was cheering for our deaths like a demented cheerleader.

Unfortunately his team spirit seemed to be enough to turn the tides, and we quickly became overwhelmed. Fancy-man and the gorilla were out for the count, but we were now facing four incredibly strong opponents who obviously relished the idea of killing us. My own strength had long faded and it was only sheer will power keeping me from shifting right then and there. The others were obviously struggling against their own fatigue and injuries as they sluggishly fought off their opponents.

I snapped to attention when screams and the smell of burnt hair and clothing filled the air. Before I could try to help I found myself struck by a blue crackle of lightning of my own.

It probably lasted only a few seconds, but it sure as hell didn't feel that short. It was so intensely painful that my screams came out silently, locked inside my throat as if afraid that letting out sound would only make the pain last longer.

Just as suddenly as it began however, it cut off. I heard a commotion around me and the horrified voices of my team, but it was hard to pay attention. I tried to get up and move; do _something_ , but I couldn't seem to get my twitching muscles to obey. I was momentarily distracted by a bright flash of golden light before a vaguely familiar scent exploded over the area. It reminded me of whatever had been in the duffel bag sea-boy carried on the ship when we'd first arrived, but the odor now was so much more intense and visceral. As strange as it might sound, the only way I could describe the smell and feel of it would be restrained chaos. Images of bloody battles fought and won and of furious demons being held behind dark cages flew through my head almost too quickly to recognize, but the feelings of cold righteousness and grim justice they left behind seared themselves into my mind.

Breaking through the haze, sea-boy's voice boomed out distortedly.

"Surrender, Wotan. You cannot hope to defeat a lord of order!"

"None but the spawn of Loki may kill me, as you well know Vidar!" The ancient one called back heatedly.

"You may not die this night Wotan, but you can be subdued until that time comes!" a new voice called out. Lifting my head up, I was able to see a large group of adult heroes led by tuxedo-man flying down from the sky as they used their respective powers to defeat the remaining villains.

The heroes gathered the unconscious villains and dumped them into a group by the rest, encircling them to make sure they couldn't escape.

"It's over." Underwear-man stated, stepping forward.

"There will be another day," the plant-woman declared with a glare.

"Another day. Another day? There will be _another_ day?!" pimp-man asked with outrage. "No! Not another day; not for any of us!" he called out with a hint of furious mirth. Pointing down at the water, the large vines from earlier swiftly rose up from the water; their thorns releasing a thick green gas explosively.

"Joker made spores, don't breathe!" underwear-man called out desperately as he dove forward and tackled the giggling man in front of him.

Lifting up into the air above the reach of the poisonous gas spreading over the area, sea-boy held his arms out in front of him, materializing a cross-like symbol in the air with golden light.

"Fear not," he called down righteously. "Fate has intervened!"

A loud noise like the reverberations of a large bell being rung sounded out and the cross-like symbol started sucking the large cloud of green spores before they could reach us. Feeling impressed, I watched as any trace of the no doubt harmful substance was whisked mysteriously absorbed and taken away in under a minute. As soon as the last of the pores were gone, sea-boy dropped his arms; letting the golden symbol vanish and flying back down to the ground.

An angry snort of disgust sounded nearby. Looking around to find the cause of it, I had to keep myself from sneezing at the sudden scent of anger and fear that washed over me as fast-boy stomped over towards the rest of our team with a pissed-off look on his face.

"What the _fuck_ were you thinking?! How could you let him put on the helmet? Nabu will _never_ release Kaldur now; he'll be trapped inside Dr. Fate forever!" the angry redhead roared to the Martian next to him furiously; looking sick with horror over his Atlantean friend's predicament.

To everyone's surprise, Sea-boy calmly shook his head and lifted his arms up, smoothly slipping the helmet off and cradling it against his side with one arm.

"Nabu let you go?" fast-boy asked in a strangled voice.

"He almost did not, but your friend Kent was most helpful." Smiling, he glanced down at the helmet and held it out for the speedster to take. "He says hello."

Making a chocking noise, the speedster gingerly grabbed the helmet and looked at it with an unreadable expression before nodding. Despite the positive outcome, I watched as he avoided meeting the others eyes and subtly moved away when it seemed like someone would come in to contact with him.

"We're done here," underwear-man ordered with a hint of exasperation in his voice. Subtly sniffing in his direction though, I detected the smell of relief and fading fear coming from him. Seems he wasn't quite as unaffected by sea-boy's experiment with the strange helmet as he wanted the others to think. 

"The super villain secret society has been neutralized. As for your performance…..it was satisfactory." While most of the team brightened and congratulated each other as if they'd just received the best possible compliment from the man, I had to keep myself from rolling my eyes in annoyance but otherwise let his words go. The only other person that seemed not to be affected by the man's words was a subdued fast-boy as he continued to quietly avoid interacting with the rest of the team.

Standing up on all four legs, I gingerly walked over to my human and stood right behind him, resting my head on his right shoulder tiredly. Despite other people being around, he surprised me when he wrapped and arm around my neck and lightly squeezed, leaning his head against mine and sighing.

Noticing the gesture, underwear man ordered us to go back to base and treat our injuries before meeting with him for mission debriefing. Begrudgingly lifting my head off my human's shoulder, I sluggishly followed behind the rest of the team as they limped back to the ship tiredly. Settling down to the floor next to the seated form of my human, I had an unpleasant flashback of our near drowning. I hadn't even realized I was letting out a low growl until I felt the solid heat of my human's hand as he scratched behind my ears comfortingly.

"Wolf?" he asked. Swallowing the unhappy rumbling in my chest, I lifted my head and put it on his thigh, absorbing his scent and warmth.

I was exhausted, in pain, and struggling to keep from transforming. Being around my human helped lessen the painful prickling in my paws, but to be honest I was becoming more certain with every passing minute that I wouldn't be able to stop myself from turning before we got back to base.

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Holy shit.

13,206 words spread over 25 pages. Again sorry this took so long to get out, I have some plot ideas that needed to be completely hammered out before I felt comfortable posting this chapter. There were tons of different directions I wanted to go and I ended up editing and rewriting this chapter a couple times to make sure this is how I wanted to move forward with the story.

If I've earned a review I'd love to hear feedback and get an idea of what you think. Do I use certain words or phrases too often? Is my writing style awkward? Are the characters being described well enough? Do they have enough emotional depth? Any words from you guys about this and anything else would be fabulous.


	4. Bereft

A/N

*Hey guys, thanks again for sticking around for this next chapter. The support and criticism I've received so far has been incredibly appreciated and a valued motivator.

*A heads up for this chapter; there's gonna be depictions of torture and somewhat sexually graphic dialogue towards the end.

*I've been painfully slow to update. Sorry about that. I'm going to work on getting these chapters out quicker, but be warned that's it's still probably going to be a bit on the slow side.

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 _"I'm sorry I put you in this position. It wasn't fair of me to ask you to keep what I am secret from the others. I wanted to tell them tonight at dinner, but it wasn't right for them to have to find out like this."_

 _Meeting my eyes steadfastly, Connor lightly squeezed the hand cradled in the warmth of his grasp and studied me for a moment before speaking._

 _"I understand why you were scared, especially after some of the….stuff I saw. I understood before all this too or I wouldn't have agreed to keep it secret, but when I saw…..no. When I felt – "_

 _Connor bit off what he was saying with a look of frustration on his face. Staying quiet, I lifted my hand out of his hold and ran my fingers through his hair comfortingly; waiting for him to figure out what he was trying to say._

 _Closing his eyes and taking a breath, he leaned into the touch for a few seconds before looking back at me with a pained look._

 _"I – the whole team. We didn't just see those memories…when M'gann and Manhunter connected us to your mind, it was different from how we got our memories back. The others were able to disconnect before it got too bad, but….I wasn't just seeing your memories, Wolf. I lived them."_

 _Not wanting to see the haunted look that had started shadowing his face, I closed my eyes but continued to lightly play with his hair. I could suddenly smell curdled milk, with a hint of metal intertwined. Emotional pain. Distress. Horror._

 _I couldn't tell who it was coming from though; him or me?_

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Waking up, the first thing I noticed was that it didn't hurt. I was a little thirsty maybe, but otherwise I was actually pretty comfortable and pain free; something that I hadn't experienced in…..too long to remember.

Looking around and keeping an ear out for signs of breathing or footsteps, I found myself blissfully alone. It was night and the moon was barely a sliver in the sky, but it provided enough light to take in my surroundings.

As far as I could see there was nothing but an endless sea of sand spreading out for miles in all directions. The air smelled slightly off too, similar to India but not quite the same. Standing up, I immediately noticed something else was different. My neck – the collar was gone!

I was free. I had no idea how, but somehow I was finally, utterly free from the control of that bastard brain-machine and that damn trigger happy gorilla-man. Glancing around a second time, I stayed alert to any possible movement. As amazing as it was to have the oppressive weight of the device gone, it made me feel painfully suspicious. I'd already tried so many times to get it off myself but the collar was designed to read my intentions and use pain to redirect them if needed. If I purposely tried to break the collar, it would and had on numerous occasions, electrocute me.

The only way I could ever get the collar off was if someone else had removed it for me.

Twisting my head around to reach as close to my neck and shoulders as possible, I sniffed my fur enquiringly to see if I could detect the scent of whoever must have taken the restraint off. I was covered in an assortment of strange and unfamiliar scents, but it barely took a second for me to pause at the smell faintly coiled around my own base scent in curious surprise.

Hot damn. Words could never express just how fucking _exquisite_ that smell was. It was a powerful, sexual, _wild_ male essence that called to me in an almost painfully primal way. I briefly considered that the scent was somehow fabricated by the brain-machine; that this was all an elaborate trick or test of some kind, but immediately discarded the idea.

The brain-machine had his own twisted genius level intelligence, but he could never have created _this_.

No, whoever's scent I was detecting must have been the one to free me. He smelled mostly human, but there was a taste of something _more_ behind it. It was possible he was like me; that he'd once been swept up in the strange blue light and changed into something else. I doubted he'd been turned into a wolf – no coincidence was _that_ great, but it would be a relief to meet someone that had gone through the same thing I did.

I felt a wave of exhaustion hit me and despite having woken up just a few minutes ago I decided it was safe enough to lie down for a nap. I had no idea where I was and running around in the dark with no source of food or water sounded like a bad idea. The sand surrounding me was surprisingly white, making me feel safer knowing that my white fur would act as a near-perfect source of camouflage to keep me hidden.

Dropping down to the ground, I ignored the coolness of the sand with practiced ease and closed my eyes as I let the comforting smell of my rescuer lull me into sleep.

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When I woke up my eyes opened with a snap, the bright rays of the sun blinding me. Ignoring the spots dancing in my vision, I focused on my sense of hearing to tell me what was wrong. I heard a loud shuffling sound, and a man grunting tiredly.

"Sorry," he said apologetically. "I'm running on empty, I don't think I've eaten in a while."

Standing up slowly, I silently walked over to the petrified sand dune separating me from the strangers. Sniffing carefully, I smelled two humans; a female and a sweaty male. There was a faint click and the male spoke again.

"Whoa," he said in surprise. "My cupboards are bare; we've been out here over 24 hours." I felt a small tremble running through the ground and narrowed my eyes at the sound of something bounding towards us with alarming speed. Standing up to my full height, I spun around to escape but was unable to run before it landed near the two humans with a ferocious crash. I quickly found out it was some sort of creature, maybe even a man if the furious, guttural roars he released were anything to go by.

I heard the male from earlier cry out in pain before crashing into the dune with heavy force, causing the hardened sand to tremble with the threat of collapse. Listening closely but not wanting to risk getting involved, I crept forward until I could peak around the rocks and watched with interest as a tall, blond female flipped backwards with flawless ease before shooting an arrow at the man attacking her.

The arrow exploded, and I felt my jaw drop in surprise as the man continued to stalk forward angrily; his skin showing no sign of harm other than some soot sprinkled over his bare torso. Looking unbothered by his lack of injury but reeking of adrenalin and fear, the girl fired off another two shots in succession with the same results. Blond-girl's eyes searched around frantically, no doubt for an escape route when a mortar shell fell behind her attacker.

Both of them fell over from the force of the explosion, but only the man stood back up. A snarl twisted his handsome face when he looked down and saw the singe marks on his jeans and black boots. With incredible force he jumped higher and farther than any normal human being possibly could, landing on top of one of two tanks that had been quietly driving our way.

It was incredible. Rather than be afraid, I found myself in awe of him as I watched the man bend and rip through the tank with barely a grunt. A soldier popped out of the top and began shooting at him, but the bullets merely bounced off his chest; a couple even recoiled back with enough force to hit the shooter.

Distracted as he was by his destruction of the tank, he didn't notice the men sneaking up behind him with harpoon-like weapons attached to thick wire netting. I doubted they would give him much trouble but almost without conscious thought my body moved on its own and ran towards the fight, barking out a warning.

Tossing aside the useless metal in his hands, the superhuman brunette glanced my way before turning around completely to face the incoming enemy with a fierce scowl. Jumping up again when they shot their guns, he avoided the flying net completely and tackled three of his attackers with animalistic grace.

Deciding to commit fully to the decision of jumping in to the fray, I led my own attack on two men dressed in military garb. I studied my opponents for a moment, noticing one had a limp. Taking the slow movement of his right leg in to account I darted forward and bit his thigh, severing the femoral artery; knowing that he would bleed out in barely a minute or two. Falling down from the pain, the man cried out in agony as I turned to face his partner and took him out as well.

"Just whose side is he on? And where'd that huge wolf come from?!" Dressed in a strange, form fitting uniform and a mop of red hair brushing his forehead, the sweaty male from earlier questioned the wobbly blond incredulously.

"You really want to stick around and find out?" the archer asked rhetorically as she allowed herself to be swept up in a bridal hold. Without a second glance the man turned and ran, going so fast that he was barely a black blur in the distance. Feeling strangely unsurprised over the unnatural speed, I glanced back just to confirm their departure and stood back to watch as the mysteriously strong man from earlier continued dealing with the last of his opponents.

Off in the distance I heard a faint sound carry over the wind. Figuring it was worth an investigation and the strong-man had things covered on his end; I turned and jogged in the direction the sound had come from, hoping I wasn't running into a trap. Seeing a group of five men dressed similarly to the foreign soldiers from earlier, I leapt in for the attack, taking one down almost immediately before launching myself at the next.

For a few minutes I was in my element – attacking enemies that actually meant me harm, not ones that I was forced by the brain-machine to take care of for him. I could pretend I was defending my pack back home, my fellow wolves fighting beside me as we safeguarded our territory or went hunting for the next meal.

I actually got so swept up in the fantasy that as the last man dropped I closed my eyes and raised my bloody snout in the air to let loose a long howl of victory. As the last notes rang out through the air I opened my eyes in mild confusion when I didn't hear the symphony of voices that should have accompanied my own. Brought back to reality, I looked around me and only saw the paw prints of one wolf in the blood-soaked sand. Sighing, I turned around only to stop at the sight of the strong-man from earlier watching me with interest. Having apparently dealt with his own battle, he'd probably been drawn to the sounds of mine.

We watched each other for a few minutes, both curious but neither one willing to make the first move. Feeling annoyed with the stalemate after a while, I finally gave in and took a step forward. To my amusement the man stepped forward as well, his foot hitting the sand at the same time my paw did. In an eerily synchronized motion, we both stepped forward another four steps before stopping, our bodies close enough that we could smell each other while maintaining a safe distance. Sniffing the air, I felt my eyes widen in surprise at the scent coming from him. Furrowing my face in confusion, I took another step closer and sniffed again, only to once again smell…

Me. And it was to such a degree that in my mind it could only mean one thing.

I had no memory of having taken a mate, but the only person I could ever imagine letting myself get close enough to leave that deeply an ingrained scent of myself on was the one I'd choose to spend the rest of my life with; even have children with at some point.

As strange as the idea of having a mate I never even remembered taking was, these days I'd had a hard time keeping conscious thought for any long period of time; the forced growth my body had been put under recently was putting my mind under too much stress. I was blacking out and acting feral more often than not, so unfortunately it was completely possible that I'd somehow found and mated someone since the last time I'd been fully conscious and aware.

I studied my mate's face carefully, and outside of having the body of a man you wouldn't have ever thought he was a civilized human being. From his body language and scent down to the growls in his throat and the lack of humanity in the cold blue eyes staring back at me; everything about him screamed wild, feral animal. It was obvious in the way he moved and scrutinized me back that he was strong and more than capable of taking me in a fight; that he was an alpha male in his prime and knew it.

If I _had_ ended up mating someone during one of my feral blackouts, I had no doubt this was the man I'd chosen.

Apparently he felt similarly, because instead of attacking he relaxed his stance and took a careful step forward before stopping and waiting for my reply. Letting myself relax into a casually alert position, I accepted the invitation and walked towards him cautiously. I left the last few steps open to keep some distance to be on the safe side before taking a look around and double-checking our surroundings.

Feeling secure, I stood and watched him for any change before deciding it was okay for him to meet me. Sensing my acceptance, he smoothly closed the distance and lifted his head carefully, his nose flared as he investigated my scent with a pleased gleam in his eyes.

Wanting to taste more of the delicious scent emanating from him, I licked his cheek carefully; only to be struck by an incredibly strong sense of déjà vu. Closing my eyes, I felt the edges of a sweet memory of standing with him in a different time or place, feeling safe and happier then I'd ever been before. I felt my mate lean forward into my fur, and the sensation jarred out of whatever memory I'd been swept up in, and it took me a minute to figure out why.

I felt my eyes widen at the realization, but otherwise didn't so much as twitch so as not to alarm the man leaning into me. Happiness radiated through me as I recalled that my body had been different in the memory. Smaller, and only standing on two legs – not four.

I was able to turn human.

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The screams of my mate rung out hoarsely. I'd lost track of how many times he'd been forced to release the sounds of his agony into the building over the last hour, but I knew I would give anything to make it stop. Trying to focus on something, _anything_ other than the person most important to me being fucking _tortured_ ; I revisited the events leading to the moment of our capture.

We'd come across an unconscious male in the desert. For someone in the middle of what I still could only assume was India, the man smelled intensely of the ocean. My mate's first reaction was to kill the stranger to be on the safe side, but something had me hold him back. I was sure I'd never seen the human before in my life, but something about his scent was familiar; enough that it had my protective instincts flaring painfully, pushing me to defend the sea-boy from my mate.

The young male was obviously delirious from too much exposure to the heat. He woke up several times, however, muttering wildly in a language neither of us understood. At one point he'd become lucid enough to try attacking, but was too weak to follow through. Worried that he'd die before I could figure out why I even wanted him alive in the first place, I left my reluctant mate with the male and left in search of a water source.

It didn't take me long to run into trouble.

I got careless and quickly became overwhelmed by a small army of soldiers shouting in an unfamiliar language as they shot a net at me and took me down in an embarrassingly short amount of time. Desperately calling out for help, I let out a howl of warning to my mate and hoped he would be able to find me in time.

A minute passed, then two and still no sign of my human. The enemy soldiers were dragging me over to an armored vehicle with some difficulty as I futily tried my best to thrash around and gnaw at the rope net tangled around me.

A thunderous roar of rage echoed across the sandy clearing, and for a moment time seemed to freeze. I smelled an intense surge of fear and shock in my captors, and with vindictive pleasure watched as they were quickly knocked down one right after the other as my mate viciously snapped trembling rifles and tossed the foolish humans aside with a furious snarl.

It took mere minutes for my beautiful mate to completely incapacitate the enemy, and for a blissful moment I truly believed we'd get away.

Unfortunately, we hadn't anticipated our opponent's substantial backup. Trapped in the net, I was worse than useless as my human valiantly fought off the crushing wave of soldiers attacking him with little success. The sheer number of men made it impossible to even see my human anymore, swarming like ants over a crumb of food until they'd completely smothered him with their bodies.

They wrapped him in a strange rope of flexible metal, like thick wire. Unable to get free, he was helpless against the strange attack sent his way by an unnaturally pale man in a black cloak-like jacket. The cloaked-man didn't go near him, but the pleased smirk that appeared on his face when my mate fell over unconscious for seemingly no reason left me certain that this human was responsible.

With their prize subdued, the men let out a cheer of victory and loaded us on to separate trucks before driving away. My only comfort in the situation was the sound of the truck my mate was on following behind closely. I hated being separated from him; hated that I was the reason he'd been taken in the first place….but found a small part of myself selfishly glad that we wouldn't be separated.

Now I was trapped in a cage and unable to do anything while my mate was being tortured in the laboratory above us. Terrified, pissed off beyond belief – these insignificant words barely scratched the surface of what I was feeling at the moment.

Hearing a break in his screams I howled as loudly as I could, putting all my heart and encouragement into the desperate cry. A moment later an exhausted roar echoed back to me; painfully hoarse from overuse but no less sweet in the reassurance it offered. Feeling a renewed determination to break free I investigated the room I was in again, hoping to find some means of breaking out that I might have missed during my earlier frenzied attempts. The room was rather barren, and to my frustration there was nothing for me to reach even if I'd tried to turn human. Pausing as an idea started forming in my head, I examined the bars of my prison critically. As a wolf, I was far too large to pass through the space, but maybe if I were human…..

Before I could contemplate shifting into my human form further the door to the room opened and the disturbing cloaked-man from earlier entered. For a moment I panicked, afraid that I was looking at the brain-machine's successful attempt at getting himself a body.

Growling, I snapped my jaws at the stranger threateningly only to freeze in place at the alarmingly unpleasant sensation of fingers brushed through my mind.

"Interesting….." the man murmured with a terrifying gleam in his eye. I blinked, but there was something strange about it; as if the split second my were closed somehow managed to mask the speeding up of time. The next thing I knew, I was blinking groggily and staring at the man in front of me with confusion. It – he _looked_ like my mate. I sniffed wearily. Hmm. He smelled like my mate too.

" –it's okay; we're safe. These–"

"Oh my god –"

"–team, they're friends."

I let out a sound that was half growl and half confused whimper. Something wasn't right. He was different, not as wild as before. The way he was speaking, the way he moved…it wasn't the same.

They did something to him. Or me.

"–really _is_ human…."

I felt my eyes widen, but the darkness of my feral state only crept closer. My ability to think like a human was fading fast. I tried to bark, whimper, whine, _anything_ to give him warning, but all that came out was a confused snarl.

"–memories. We're going to let you out –"

"Don't attack –"

"Watch out! She's –"

"–wait! Don't –"

A feral howl of blood-thirsty rage roared loudly in my ears, and I felt afraid for someone. I just couldn't remember who.

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When I woke up again, I was in an unfamiliar place and surrounded by enemies. A tall male dressed all in black approached me and made strange noises, but when I tried jumping forward to attack the intruder a short length of chain wrapped around my neck held me back from getting close enough to rip his throat out.

I snarled my fury at the group, satisfied when a wave of fear drifted from several members.

Good. Even tied up, I am _not_ a wolf you want to fuck around with.

The man in black didn't come any closer, but another male dared to walk forward in his stead. I wasn't sure whether to feel irritated that I was being underestimated or delighted that I would get the chance to feel this foolish creature's blood drip down my snout as he –

Wait. This male smells familiar. Not….enemy…..? Smells like pack.

Distantly, I felt a small hint of human thought enter my mind. This…person? Yes. He's a person, a….human being. My human. I should let my human close; keep him protected.

But protected from what? He didn't smell afraid, only worried. Something smelled burnt too, and I knew it was him. Did the other humans do this to him?

Growling in frustration, I felt a headache knife through my brain, the dizzying and unfocused thoughts making it hard to focus. Warily, I watched as my human slowly made his way towards me, reaching a hand out to pet behind my ears when I didn't make a move to attack. He made noises like the other one had….speaking. Yes, he was speaking.

I just wished I understood what he was saying. A small green female hesitantly walked up, stopping short of my reach when I growled suspiciously. Raising her hand without another word, I found myself in another room with the others. We were surrounded by a dizzying number of images swirling around the walls, and I was vaguely able to recognize them as memories.

My human started speaking again, and I was relieved to finally start understanding some of what he was saying.

"Wolf – inside – head. M'gann – – team – use – memories – help to –"

Still feeling confused, I didn't have much warning before being plunged into memories I later knew for a fact were _not_ all my own.

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(Note: Connor's memories will all be in complete italics. Everyone else's memories aren't in italics.

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 **Mt. Justice**

 **September 26**

 _No!" Connor exclaimed with an alarmed look on his face. Seeing the confusion from the others around him, he glanced back at the large canine next to him and quickly backtracked._

" _No. Wolf is smart; she can follow body language and commands really well. Linking her mind to ours could overwhelm her – I don't think it's a good idea for this mission, especially without having practiced it first. Besides, she'll be with me wherever I go; worrying about maintaining radio silence while we're in Bialya isn't necessary."_

 _M'gann shrugged and nodded, accepting his excuse easily even if she did give him a curious backwards glance as she walked into the red ship. The others followed behind her, with Wolf and Connor following up in the rear. Once Wally boarded, Connor moved to step forward and follow when he felt a delicate tug on the back of his shirt collar. Looking back, he was met with a small lick from the white canine behind him._

 _Connor felt his heart beat quicken as he looked into his companion's eyes and a brief flash of memory fluttered over his thoughts, barely more than a picture in time, of a young woman with Wolf's eyes smiling at him. Knowing M'gann would connect to his thoughts once everyone was on board, he quickly shoved the image down and leaned against the soft fur behind him, accepting the lick for the thanks he knew it was before moving forward again._

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

Jerking back from the aggressively violent young woman he'd just woken, Kid Flash jerked back to avoid a reactive punch.

"Woah, hey. It's ok – I won't hurt you." Smiling in what he hoped was a nonthreatening way, he backed up a step. "I'm one of the good guys, you know, Kid Flash."

"….I've seen Kid Flash on the news," the blond teen replied disbelievingly. "He doesn't wear black."

Glancing down at his uniform with sheepish curiosity, he nodded good-naturedly. "Heh, yeah. I'm a little unclear on that myself. What about you?" he raised an eyebrow curiously and gestured to her costume. "Green Arrow fixation?"

Looking down, the blonde's jaw dropped in surprise. "Who put me in this?!"

"Um. Wow. I, um. I'm not touching that with a 10-foot –" he cut off at the suspicious glare sent his way. "…Never mind. Uh, so you know how to use that bow?" changing topics, he pointed to the forest green weapon sitting next to her.

"Yeah, my dad taught me." Stiffening, she glanced around suspiciously. "Dad," she growled. " _He_ must have done this! _Another_ one of his stupid tests."

"What kind of test?"

She shrugged nonchalantly. "He probably wants me to kill you."

* * *

 **Mt. Justice**

 **September 06**

 _Despite her obvious exhaustion, M'gann guided the bioship into a smooth landing with practiced ease. Slumping in her seat, the Martian tiredly announced their arrival and opened the door. Kaldur quietly thanked her and joined the others in unbuckling themselves and waiting for their turn to exit the ship._

" _Ugh, I smell like swamp," Artemis complained._

" _We just got the crap beaten out of us in the Louisiana Bayou by not one, but seven of the toughest enemies we've ever faced. We were electrocuted, gassed by creepy monster-vines, and almost drowned in alligator infested waters. Right now I'm kind of okay with smelling bad; it's the least of our problems," the speedster next her replied dryly as he slowly rose from his seat._

 _Connor was the first to exit, as he was closest to the door. Carrying a near comatose Wolf in his arms rather awkwardly because of her huge size, he quickly made his way down the ramp towards the green door leading deeper into the mountain. Wally watched them with concern, looking over at the boy wonder next to him with a questioning look._

" _Probably taking her to Medical," Robin commented wearily. Nodding, the ginger followed behind Artemis as she limped out of the ship._

" _Wolf might be the most banged up out of all of us. She really wasn't looking to good on the way back."_

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

"Well J'onn, the costume looks familiar but I'm not sure the new bod' screams 'Manhunter'." Wally commented, staring at the very female, very green person in front of him.

"You know my uncle J'onn?" Smacking her forehead, the Martian nodded with dawning comprehension. " _Hello_ , M'gann, of course you do."

She pointed to the speedster. "You're Kid Flash – Wally."

Rotating, her finger turned to the blond next to him. "And you're Artemis."

"Whoa, hey, wait a minute there. Martian Manhunter's your _uncle_? Is that how you know my name?"

"Your name's really Wally?" Artemis asked with amusement. Looking embarrassed, Wally groaned and hid his face in his hands.

"Hey, it's okay," M'gann tried to soothe. "We're teammates; friends. I even made you cookies."

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

"KF! Man is it good to see a familiar face." Robin stepped forward, raising his arm to meet Wally's in a fist bump.

"Hey, Rob! Memory loss?"

Snorting in annoyance, the boy wonder dropped the smile that'd been on his face and frowned.

"Yeah, dude. Six _months_."

Glaring at the lifeless soldiers around him with an unusually contemptuous fire in his eyes, Robin's leg twitched for a second as if he'd just restrained it from kicking the unconscious man on the ground next to him. Looking back up at his best friend, the brunette reached for his belt and withdrew a thin length of rope.

"Let's hogtie these creeps and compare notes."

* * *

 **Mt. Justice**

 **September 06**

" _Wolf, wait!" Connor called out with a startled look on his face. He'd set her down on the table and turned around to input the examination command into the computer when he heard her fall down with a soft whimper. Jerking around, he was shocked to see her running out the door in an all-out sprint._

 _Trying to follow her, he accidentally bumped into a corner of the table, tripping him over and denting the metal surface. With a soft curse he regained his balance and took off down the hallway; reaching the closing doors of the elevator in time to see a panting Wolf watching him with fear. Unable to stop the doors from closing in time, he held himself back from angrily punching a hole in the metal keeping him from the canine and instead looked up at the numbers indicating what floor she'd get off on._

 _Feeling his impatience spike as the numbers slowly continued to decrease without pause, he decided to throw caution to the wind and run down the stairs at an adrenalin fueled speed that would have impressed his mentor, Black Canary. Desperately keeping an ear out for Wolf, he distantly heard the pinging sound of the elevator on the ground floor and the soft scratching of Wolf's nails against cool concrete._

 _Feeling a trickle of sweat run down his face, Connor wiped his forehead on the black t-shirt covering his shoulder and descended the last two flights of stairs. Finally reaching the bottom he paused and sniffed the air for his companion, giving a sharp nod at her scent before pushing open the door leading outside._

 _The wind was strong that night and quickly masked any sounds or scents that would have helped Connor find Wolf. Feeling frustrated, he took a step forward and was just about to run in a random direction and hope he was lucky when a different idea popped into his head._

 _Wolf sniffed at the air a lot, but when she really wanted to find something, she followed what she could smell on the ground. Dropping to his knees and immediately feeling the moisture of the grass and dirt through his jeans, the teen clone felt a brief surge of embarrassment. He was about to sniff the grass like a dog; Superman would never –_

 _No. Screw Superman and what he'd do, this was for Wolf._

 _Shoving away the negative thoughts that had started forming in his head, Connor lowered his body closer to the ground and tentatively sniffed around until he caught the scent he was looking for. Crawling around, he followed the trail for a few feet before getting up and running after her._

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

"So, we're a team?" Robin asked.

"The four of us and Superboy," M'gann agreed with a smile.

The boy wonder frowned, grabbing the remains of a torn black t-shirt with a red symbol on it from his utility belt.

"Then this must be his," he commented, holding the fabric up for the others to see. Brightening, M'gann kept her eyes glued to the shirt hopefully.

"Yes! Did you see him?"

"I think _we_ did," Artemis piped in unenthusiastically.

Studying the fabric with a speculative look, Wally rubbed his chin and nodded. "Feral boy and that freaky dog of his? Some teammate," he griped.

"Dog?"

"Yeah, some ginormous wolf monstrosity that ran off with him after he freaking attacked us."

"He didn't know who we are," Artemis defended. "Hell, _I_ don't know who we are."

"I remember Batman ordering radio silence; our team must work for him," Robin commented slowly; looking like he was furiously trying to search his mind for any other clues.

"Hey, how do you know we don't work for _my_ mentor?" Wally asked with a smirk. "Whoa," he blinked in surprise as the thumb he'd jabbed backwards into his chest triggered his suit into changing from black into its usual yellow and red color scheme.

"This is so cool!" he cried out with delight, watching curiously as the others poked themselves several times to see if they could initiate a similar response in their own costumes.

"We look ridiculous," Artemis commented dryly; dropping her prodding hand when nothing happened. Next to her the red-headed speedster had taken to poking his chest repeatedly, watching with childlike fascination as he changed his uniform's colors back and forth with increasing speed.

"Quit touching yourself!" the blond ordered with an exasperated flair of irritation in her voice. Smirking, the redhead opened his mouth to reply when Robin decided to step in.

"Look, we need our memories back. Trying to move around or make plans without them is only going to make the situation more dangerous. If we concentrate and go over – whoa…." He trailed off; looking at the strange landscape of broken memories he and the others had unceremoniously been brought to inside the Martian's mind. It was like standing in a room full of hundreds of televisions, only instead of playing shows the screens revealed the team's various memories.

"…Well, this works too."

"I brought you into my mind to share what I've remembered so far, but I need your help. Together, our broken memories can form a whole….. _If_ you open your minds to mine." M'gann volunteered cautiously, looking like she fully expected their rejection.

Alarmed, the group's archer stepped back with her arms raised as if to shield off an attack. "You want to paw through our private thoughts?!"

"I truly don't wish to intrude, but –"

"–You need to hack our minds to undo what happened to us. Got it." Flapping his hands in a 'get moving' motion, Robin looked at her expectantly. "Go ahead," he added for emphasis when it became obvious the young woman was still hesitating. Understanding she needed encouragement after a meaningful glance from the acrobat next to him, Wally stepped forward and flashed a charming if somewhat playfully cocky smile.

"My brain's all yours. Please, try not to let its brilliance overwhelm you," he invited magnanimously.

"Or underwhelm you." Robin couldn't help adding.

"Hey!"

Ignoring the indignant redhead, Robin tilted his head thoughtfully. "Y'know, I just realized that people are always feeling overwhelmed or underwhelmed, but what I want to know is why anyone isn't ever just _whelmed_?"

Looking at his friend oddly, Wally shook his head. "What does that even –"

"Fine, you can do your _mind rape_ ," Artemis grudgingly butted in with a hostile grimace. "But the last six months _only_ ," she added emphatically, glancing at the televisions around them with distrust. "And even then, only what you _absolutely_ need."

The two boys frowned at the blonde's word choice, but otherwise stayed silent and nodded their agreement.

* * *

"–and the watchtower detected an immense power surge in the Bialyan desert. Spectral analysis revealed elements non-terrestrial in origin. I need you to find out what happened at that site and what landed there." Bringing up a holographic map of the country behind him, Batman pointed to the highlighted mission site for emphasis.

"Keep in mind that Bialya is a rogue state ruled by Queen Bee, _not_ a member of the League's U.N. Charter. All communications are subject to interception so you _must m_ aintain radio silence at all times. Now M'gann," he called, turning to look at the Martian. "Have the bioship land in Kourak, on Bialya's border; two klicks from the hot zone. It will bring you –"

* * *

Wally looked through the binoculars carefully, keeping an eye out for any sign of an enemy presence.

" _All clear_." He directed telepathically, giving a thumbs up to the others. Glancing over, he watched in amusement as Wolf followed behind Superboy worriedly as the superhumanly strong teen carted the heavy supply depot strapped to his back down the ramp leading out of the ship. He almost called out to Wolf to reassure her, but figured the canine wouldn't really listen anyway.

For an animal, he mused, she was oddly human in how she acted around Superboy and the rest of the team.

" _The Bialyans already control the site._ " Artemis commented as she and Robin watched foreign soldiers and scientists swarm the hot zone from a hidden overlook. A little over a mile away, the others nodded and continued to set up a temporary base camp while the team leader gave his next set of orders.

" _Understood. Maintain position while we finish preparations and let us know if there are any changes."_

" _Got it."_

Turning to face the others, the Atlantean pointed to a flat patch of sand. _"Superboy, you can set up here."_

Nodding, the half-Kryptonian carefully crouched down, setting the load on his back to the ground and unstrapping it from his shoulders. Walking over to the depot, Robin gave Wolf's back a quick pat and smiled before tapping a button on the depot that would release their equipment and allow him access to the computer installed in the machine.

" _We'll be up and running in no time."_ Typing with his usual near superhuman speed, the boy wonder quickly had the computer do a scan of the enemy's camp; almost immediately finding what he was looking for.

" _Jackpot! The site's lousy with zeta beam radiation and there's a concentration of non-terrestrial trace elements from the Bialyan's main tent."_

" _Are you able to discover the planet's origins?"_

" _Already working on it."_ Robin typed a few more commands into the computer, but quickly shook his head and frowned.

" _Nothing's coming up in any known data bases both on and off world. A couple elements are recognized, but there's about twenty-three planets – including our own – that those elements are found on. Paired with the other unknown elements however, I'd have to say that whatever's in that tent's from a system neither earth or our allies haven't made contact with yet."_

" _I can check it out in camouflage mode,"_ Miss. Martian offered.

" _Good idea,"_ their leader agreed after thinking about it for a moment. _"Go, and be sure to maintain telepathic contact. Be careful, Miss Martian."_

" _I will, Aqualad."_

* * *

"Aqualad!" They all gasped in shock, breaking out of the mindscape M'gann had brought them into.

"Where is he? What happened next?" Robin wondered worriedly.

"I don't know! That's the last thing I – we remember." M'gann replied, shaking her head unhappily.

Crossing his arms, Wally looked around as if hoping he'd conveniently find the Atlantean passed out on the ground next to him. "We landed over 24 hours ago. If Kaldur'ahm's been wandering the desert that long…..well, that's really not good for a guy with gills."

"Understatement. Now that I know to look for him though….." the boy wonder trailed off, pressing a couple buttons on his watch. Bringing up a holographic map, he ran a scan and examined the area's layout out closely until he spotted a red dot hovering in a spot near their position.

"He's close! But not moving."

Nodding decisively, he verbalized what they were all thinking.

"Let's go."

* * *

They'd found Kaldur quickly, but their leader was in a dangerously bad state.

"I can't restore his memories in this condition," M'gann stated helplessly.

"Then call the bioship. He needs immediate rehydration," Robin ordered with a steely edge to his voice.

"It's out of range," She shook her head regretfully before glancing at the redhead next to her hopefully. "Wally, _you_ can get him there fast."

Looking a little unsteady on his feet, Wally was forced to refuse. "I'm sorry guys but he's too heavy, and I'm too low on fuel." Pointing a trembling finger to the blond next to him he tried to lighten the mood. "Right now, I couldn't even carry her – and she's surprisingly light."

Unsurprised, Robin nodded. He'd noticed his friend's worsening condition; it's why he'd intended to ask M'gann to levitate the Atlantean back instead of asking the starving teen next to him to take him. With how badly the teen was starting to shake and the amount of effort it was taking him to walk, it was obvious the speedster's metabolism was already starting go in to shock and forcing his body to cannibalize itself in order to keep his organs from shutting down.

Feeling a cool thread of suspicion lace through him, he turned to the green woman crouched regretfully by Kaldur.

"Why not just levitate him back?" Robin asked, already knowing the answer. M'gann shook her head stubbornly.

"I can't. I have to find Superboy." Seeing the looks of disbelief and anger on the other's faces, she quickly tried to explain herself. "Look, six months ago Superboy didn't even _exist_. He has no memories – just animal impulse and a giant wolf that still thinks she's under the Brain's orders to attack people. I'm the only one who can help him."

"Superboy's indestructible," Wally reasoned. "Just ask those tanks he destroyed earlier – with Wolf's help I might add." He continued pointedly. "Wolf might not even have been affected the same way we were, or at least to the same degree. Whatever memories she does or doesn't have, she was fighting _with_ him earlier, not against. I think it's safe to say that those two are together and probably a lot healthier and happier than our dangerously dehydrated leader over there."

"But –"

"Superboy's fine, M'gann. It's Aqualad who needs your help."

Said Atlantean was an unnaturally pale color, and his moans of pain had grown noticeably weaker even in the short amount of time they'd been there. With angry steel in his voice, Robin commanded the Martian to take their incapacitated leader back to the ship.

"We'll figure out a plan to get to Superboy," the brunette promised. "But if Aqualad doesn't get immediate attention, his organs will shut down and he'll die."

The young woman reeled back in shock, and for a moment Robin thought he'd finally gotten through to her. The next words out of her mouth however left him flabbergasted, his hope of getting his Atlantean friend the medical attention he desperately needed dashed.

"No!" M'gann cried out, flying up into the air. "Superboy's in pain; we can't wait!"

"Damn it M'gann!" Artemis cursed.

In a desperate last ditch attempt to keep her from running off, Robin screamed after her quickly retreating back. "We still don't know what erased our memories! It could happen again! M'gann!"

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

I was going to tear him apart. I would make him and all the others fucking _bleed_. They were going to suffer, gasping with their last breath to beg me for the mercy of death.

I glared at the pig-nosed little rat bastard scientist that smiled with sick pleasure every time he pushed the button that -

A shock of electricity tore through me and I let out another scream, nearly blacking out again. I almost didn't have the energy to give in to the painful cough that gripped me afterwards, but I forced myself to push through it and hack out the blood that was slowly choking my lungs.

I snarled with a heaving breath, watching droplets of spittle and blood spray out from between my clenched teeth and land on his white jacket. I wrinkled my nose in disgust as, rather than getting mad or looking scared about it, another wave of arousal and amusement wafted from the man torturing me. Chuckling, he increased the power on the computer and raised a finger over the red button that would send another shock through me, letting it hover threateningly.

"It's at shock level eight now," he taunted. "This next level might even kill you. To be honest though, it wouldn't surprise me if you _did_ survive. I've been incredibly impressed with how well you've held up so far; the little boy you came with barely made it to six before fainting from the pain."

Dropping his hand away from the button, he casually walked over to the table I was currently strapped to; his smile widening. I tried to jerk and strain away, but was unable to move enough to avoid the caress he swept over the skin of my breasts and down my stomach.

"You look human, but inside this beautiful body of yours you're still a wild animal, aren't you? Barely more than a rabid _bitch_." With a snap of his hands he grabbed my chest roughly, tweaking a nipple with brutal force. Most of my body was numb from the electricity sent through it, but I could still feel the painful burn of humiliation and fierce anger left behind from his ministrations.

"Animals and women were built to withstand pain. They were born for the sole purpose of being taken to the limits of what their sanity can hold – and then being pushed some more."

Looking disappointed with my lack of reaction to his attack, I had barely a second to realize his next plan and clench my thighs together tightly before he snaked a hand down my torso; scratching his fingernails over my skin forcefully as he reached further south.

"You seem to be both a woman and an animal, a _fascinating_ combination; one that I can't wait to explore the limits of."

Pausing just above his target, he splayed his hand over my stomach and rested it on the clammy skin with a curious look on his face.

"We tortured that boy you came with for nearly an hour and barely got a reaction," he began conversationally. "But the second he heard your screams, the artifact reacted quite intensely. Now my little bitch, tell me. What exactly is the nature of your relationship with that boy?"

I was way past the point of doing anything but snarl or growl. I snapped at him angrily, unable to retrieve enough of my human side to do much else. Nodding as if I'd given him the answer he wanted least, he sighed.

"I thought so. Not that I can blame him, really. Having a little bitch like you in heat and at your master's mercy; bent over on your hands and knees, begging for your master's cock…." He shivered and dug his fingers deeper into my stomach. "….Yes. That would be _quite_ the treat."

Chuckling, he dropped his hand only to get up on the table, swinging his leg around to straddle me. The feeling of his arousal pressed against my stomach made my skin crawl, and not for the first time that night I felt terror flash through over his intentions. Placing his hands on either side of my head, the man's brown eyes gleamed as he bent over me, using the motion to grind himself on my stomach.

"I was always the child that wanted dessert _before_ dinner," he whispered, his breath smelling oddly of black licorice. Wrinkling my nose at the odor, I snapped my head forward as if to bite him and he jerked back with an alarmed gasp. Glaring angrily, he brought his fist back and shot if forward, hitting my face hard enough to jerk it to the side and make my neck ache with the whiplash.

I was saved from further abuse with the sound of static crackling out of the radio on the table next to the control panel. The doctor on top of me watched the radio for a second, his eyes narrowing angrily when the device came alive with the sound of another man's voice. I couldn't understand the language being spoken, but whatever he said was apparently directed at my tormentor.

With a hiss of annoyance, he pushed himself off of me and got back down from the table, stalking over to the control panel with the stomp of a pouting child. Picking up the radio, he spoke back in forth with the other person for a few minutes, the two seeming to get in an argument over something. Looking angry, he eventually slammed the device down on the table with a dramatic sigh of regret.

"Unfortunately little bitch, the absence of your cries has been noted. I suppose you could take comfort in the fact that your dog-fucking little boy was able to tell the difference between recordings of your screams and the real thing…." He double-checked the power settings with a nasty smile and pressed the button.

"But I doubt you'll be left with enough sanity to do so."

* * *

 **Mt. Justice**

 **September 06**

 _He'd finally caught up with her. He was dripping in sweat, covered in grass stains, mud, and what he was pretty sure was wild rabbit crap, but he'd finally found the white canine._

 _Connor just wished she looked happier to see him._

 _Following the trail over the course of a mile, he'd eventually cornered a panicked and obviously exhausted Wolf in front of a barricade of trees. It hit him suddenly that he'd been so focused on going after her that he hadn't once stopped to consider why she might be running from him in the first place. It was a strange expression for an animal to have, but Wolf looked like she wanted to cry._

" _What's wrong?" He asked, a strange buzz of fear shooting through him._

 _A pained whimper was his answer, but before the brunette could get close enough to examine her more thoroughly he found himself freezing in place at the sickening sound of cracking bone. Wolf hunched over in a half-crouch, eyes tightly shut and a harsh panting clawing its way out of her distorting jaws. Something seemed to ripple under her skin in a foreign way that distantly reminded him of an alien movie Wally had once made him watch._

 _Whatever was happening to Wolf was quick. Bones continued to break and reform into different sizes and shapes, body parts disappeared or changed. After barely two minutes had passed, a dumbstruck Superboy was staring at the sweating, trembling body of a naked and heavily scarred young woman._

"… _..Wolf?"_

* * *

 _It was dark out, and members of the team had long since cleaned up and gone to their respective homes. Batman had taken one look at the exhausted and injured team and decided the mission report could wait until tomorrow._

 _Connor was grateful for that. It'd been difficult trying to act normal. Like nothing was wrong. Changed._

 _Wolf was still outside._

 _No…._

 _The woman Wolf had changed into was outside._

 _With a light blush and an odd twitch he couldn't quite suppress, Connor recalled with crystal clear clarity all the smooth curves that defined the naked body he'd seen just a few minutes ago. He'd received a basic education from the Genomorphs about the female human body, but to actually see it in person was completely different._

 _He remembered the way her long hair clung to the pale figure beneath it, the way it dipped and curved around her –_

"– _Connor. Are you okay? Where's Wolf?" M'gann asked curiously, looking around for the canine._

" _Sleeping," Connor quickly lied. He couldn't bring himself to look the female Martian in the eye, and wasn't sure why. It wasn't as if she needed eye contact to read his thoughts, but the young man felt a strange surge of guilt pull his gaze down to stare at the ground uneasily._

" _Oh. Okay, well, do you want something to eat? Kaldur just went to bed, but I'm still feeling kind of hungry. I could put together a couple sandwiches and –"_

" _No," he interrupted uncomfortably. "Not hungry. I'm just going to, um, go to bed."_

 _Seeing the disappointed look on the Martian's face, he quickly added a word of thanks for the offer before turning around and heading for the elevator. When the doors opened however, instead of heading to the floor above he pressed the button that would take him back to the ground floor._

 _It felt like time had slowed to a near standstill, inside that small space. Feeling overwhelmed, Connor punched the 'stop' button and let out a long sigh._

 _Wolf. The giant canine he'd come to think of as a best friend and trusted confidant was actually human. Well, maybe not entirely human. But still. She'd hidden a huge secret like this from him. Had she been laughing at him the entire time? Was she a spy for The Brain?_

 _Snorting, he leaned back against the cool metal walls and closed his eyes. No. Maybe it was pathetically naive thinking on his part, but he couldn't bring himself to believe that Wolf meant him any harm. That the time they'd spent together was all a lie._

 _Looking ahead at the closed doors in front of him, he could see a distorted reflection of himself in the polished steel. The face looking back at him was calm, even a little cheerful. It was weird and probably inappropriate, considering the situation._

 _He was being…illogical. He knew that. Superman would probably have reported her to the League immediately, or at least locked her up as soon as he'd found out what was going on. Superman would have handled things better. Superman….._

 _Superman wouldn't be feeling happy._

 _Connor knew he should be feeling angry, hurt, or betrayed…any of these things. It's what a normal person would be feeling. It's what the man he'd been cloned from would probably be feeling._

 _Studying his reflection, he focused closely on his mouth._

 _It was strange. Stupid. Abnormal._

 _He couldn't quite figure out why, but knowing that a human Wolf was waiting for him outside was making him smile._

* * *

 **Bialya**

 **September 27**

Snapping her eyes open and reeling back like she'd been slapped, M'gann jerked away from the dazed clone in front of her. Hearing the gasps and sounds of shock from the others didn't make her feel better.

It didn't take away the painful burn of betrayal and hurt.

"What the hell was _that_?!" Artemis called out angrily.

"Wolf's human?"

"Dude, _not_ cool."

"You….you kept this from us. Lied to our faces!" M'gann accused. Grimacing at the headache pounding in his head, Connor nodded silently. Stepping up to the pair, Robin studied his half-Kryptonian friend seriously.

"Why?" the boy wonder asked simply. Sighing, Connor ran a hand through his hair anxiously before meeting his eyes.

"Look, it's – we were planning on telling you today; it's why I brought up the idea of the team having the dinner party we were supposed to have tonight before getting called in for the mission. It's just –"

"Wait, M'gann was the one that invited everyone over," Artemis interrupted with a suspicious glance to the Martian.

"Connor gave me the idea for it though. He was asking me all sorts of questions about what a dinner party was like and I thought it would be nice if….." M'gann trailed off uncertainly. Wrapping her arms around herself anxiously, she darted hurt-filled hazel eyes back towards the solemn clone watching her.

"I knew you guys would figure out something was up if I were the one putting the dinner together. Wolf thought I should do it anyway; she didn't want to trick you like that. I'm the one that decided to do it this way. I'm sorry."

Looking like he understood how inadequate the apology was, Connor shook off the last of the disorienting surge of memory sliding into his brain and shakily stood up.

"It's not a good time to talk about this right now," he stated with a deadly serious expression. Not even waiting for the others, he took off in a run down the hall where the hoarse sound of Wolf's tortured screams could be heard starting up again.

* * *

 **Mt. Justice**

 **September 27**

Shifting uncomfortably, Wally was the first to break the silence.

"Did anyone else see her body?" He asked. Whipping around, Artemis scowled angrily and punched him in the gut.

"Ugh, what was _that_ for?!" He asked indignantly, cradling an arm over his stomach protectively.

"I can't believe you!" She hissed. "After all that's happened on this mission you're seriously gonna stand there and get _pervy_ on her? What the hell is _wrong_ with you?!" Frowning angrily, he stood up straight and crossed his arms.

"Stop jumping to stupid conclusions, I wasn't 'perving' on her! I was talking about all those scars and, and all the stuff that sicko was doing when we found her."

The female archer looked like she wanted to fight some more at that, but quickly deflated. Wrapping her arms around herself uncomfortably, she turned her head and looked away.

"I….there were just so many scars. And what that man was trying to do, I can't even…..that's every female hero's worst nightmare. It's what half the bad guys we put away promise to do to us if they ever get free."

Coming up behind her, Kaldur put a hand on her shoulder in comfort.

"Artemis, do you recall the conversation we had this morning?"

Blinking, she frowned for a second before comprehension smoothed over her face. Watching in understanding, he continued.

"Wolf is a prime example of how what we do matters. Though the Brain escaped we were able to save her and countless others from his torture. If you read the report from the Justice League, there were several people being held in the Brain's compound; because of us they were spared from being killed or worse. Being on this team isn't glamorous and there will be many difficult trials ahead but the work we do is incredibly important. As for that…..man," he continued darkly, "between what he had done to Wolf and the part he played in illegally transporting and experimenting on unknown alien artifacts, he will not be allowed out of prison for a _very_ long time."

Dropping her arms, the blond archer straightened her back and gave a weary, if determined nod. Looking around at the others, she could see her own grim resolution reflected in the eyes of all her teammates.

All except one.

Turning away and closing her eyes, M'gann clasped her hands together tightly and turned her body away so the others wouldn't be able to see the fear and uncertainty tearing at the ruins of her control.

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A/N

*I hope this chapter wasn't too confusing. I wanted to stick to Wolf's POV, but I thought using the other's memories to explain the stuff going on in this 'episode' and part of the last one would be cool. I seriously prefer writing in third person POV over doing it in first, but I'll keep working to improve on my technique so it gets better.

*For those of you who may not know, a 'klick' is a unit of measurement used by the U.S. military (maybe other English speaking countries as well, but I don't know for sure). It's easy to hear the word 'kilometer' on the radio and mistake it for 'meter'. To avoid miscommunication on what distance to use, kilometers became klick, a more distinctive word that would be less likely to be misunderstood. Pronunciation of 'klick' is the same as the word 'click' or 'clique'. Two klicks, as mentioned in the story, is about 1.2 miles or 2 kilometers.


	5. Terrors

WARNING:

The first few paragraphs may be disturbing in nature, as they depict murder and the aftermath of torture. The rest of the story is as usual, but you've been warned.

Otherwise, hi guys! Happy Fourth of July for those of you with me in the U.S., and thank you to all my readers across the world for your continued interest in this story. I know my writing can be rough at times, but this story has already been a huge help in working to improve that.

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The entire room reeked of the smell of blood, human waste, and rotting flesh. Hearing a strange sound near a corner of the room, I briefly considered turning back. I knew no good could come of investigating whatever poor creature was currently "resting" after the brain-machine's latest experiments. Still, I couldn't stop myself from investigating. The brain-machine had been strangely….benevolent to the animals the last few days, and I needed to know what had left him in such a good mood.

 _I should have known….._

Walking deeper into the concrete room, I tried to ignore the various machinery and instruments neatly put away in all corners of the room. No matter how big a mess it made, the brain-machine was always meticulous about caring for his….toys.

I made my way over to the table in the center and paused, my body freezing in shock. It took a moment for my brain to catch up with the horrific image I was seeing, and when the understanding hit me the nausea followed as well. Unable to stop myself, I turned my head and threw up on the floor, gagging until there was nothing left in my stomach to expel.

Hearing the strange rasping sound again, my head reluctantly turned to look at the woman on the table; her eye lids fluttering as she tried to focus on me. Her mouth moved slowly as if trying to form words but I knew the lack of teeth in her mouth would make it difficult.

Trying not to look at the rotting, infected remains of the melted flesh and muscle her body had been reduced to, I swallowed the rising bile in my throat and stepped closer.

"– die," she breathed, her voice so hoarse that the words wouldn't have been heard by anyone without enhanced hearing.

"Kill…..kill…..me."

Without even thinking about it, I stepped forward to do as she asked. Realizing what I had done, I paused and looked down at the dying creature in front of me.

 _Had I already become so used to following such awful requests?_

Seeing this woman's condition, I could immediately tell there was no coming back from what had been done to her. Even if I didn't do anything, I doubted this human would live more than a few more minutes.

The woman must have felt the tears dripping from my fur to her face as I hesitated over her neck, because her eyes fluttered again, the lids opening with what had to have been enormous effort.

I didn't want to do this. I didn't want to kill her, or sink my teeth into the raw tissue of her neck. I didn't want to see the flickering light in her hazel eyes shut down completely, her empty stare haunting me in my sleep even years later.

We stared at each other for what felt like forever, until a tickling sensation on the neck of my fur caught my attention. Jerking my head back, I fought not to show my disgust at the falling maggot that must have crawled from the others moving underneath the charred remains of her bra. Gingerly placing my teeth over her jugular, I barely heard the " – ank….ou…" before snapping down my jaws, the sudden taste of septic blood in my mouth a final souvenir of what I was doing…..of what I'd become.

A murderer _._

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 **Mount Justice – Personal Quarters**

 **Day 1**

With a sharp gasp, Connor jolted up and tore the sheet off his body; his quick footsteps leading him straight to the bathroom. He slammed the door behind him, but with my heightened hearing I could still clearly hear the sound of his retching into the toilet. After a minute of gagging, the toilet flushed and the sink began to run as he rinsed out his mouth to get rid of the lingering taste.

It had been two weeks since the mission to Bialya, and my human was still having nightmares. He hated talking about them, but I could almost always figure out what he'd seen. How could I not? They were my memories.

"What did you see?" I asked when he came back to bed, not wanting to look up at him and see the exhaustion in his face.

"…."

"What did you see, Connor?" I asked more forcefully, needing to know what new hell I was putting my human through.

"The – the woman," he quietly admitted. I paused, trying to bring to mind the person he was talking about, but I had no idea who it was. There'd been too many.

"Which one?" I reluctantly had to ask.

"There's more than one?" Closing his eyes, he shook his head with a sound of disbelief. "Of course there's more than one. The one I saw was the one with….with the hazel eyes."

"Shit," I cursed. "That's a bad one. One of the worst, actually."

"Yeah," Connor agreed shortly, his blue eyes dark with the emotions he was working through. "Who was she?"

Sighing, I patted the spot next to me in silent invitation and waited while my human made his way over and joined me, the Kryptonian immediately tugging the blankets around him like armor.

"I don't know her name. It might be somewhere in all that stuff that was brought over after you rescued us from the brain-machine's compound. But hazel eyes was…..I was pretty messed up after that. I mean, I saw and heard some of what he did, but actually seeing the end result like that was something else entirely. She was also my first kill."

Blue eyes shot up to stare at me, and I shifted uncomfortably under the weight of the gaze.

"First kill?"

"Yeah," I confirmed quietly. "The first human being I'd ever….killed. And my hum – Connor, you shouldn't have that in your head. You shouldn't know what's it's like to do that to another person."

I watched as he frowned and opened his mouth for the usual retort, but I was getting tired of having to stand by and watch _my_ memories eat away at him the way they had been.

"Look, I know you _can_ handle it – I'm asking you not to."

"It's …..it's not easy, but I'll be – "

"Fine?" I interrupted again with a scowl. "Because my hu– Connor, you're not fine. You aren't sleeping or eating, and when you talk to the others you've been angry and turning aggressive at the slightest thing anyone says." Shifting to stare at him, I couldn't stop the sadness from leaking into my voice.

"Connor, you're acting the way I did when I was still with the brain-machine. Nobody should know what it was like there. I wouldn't wish my memories on the brain-machine himself; let alone the person I –" I cut off suddenly, unsure of what I was about to say.

"Please," I quietly asked. "I don't want you to have those memories anymore; I don't want you turning into who I had to be in order to survive the compound. I don't want you to be…..me."

"But I like who you are," he replied halfheartedly, the feeble attempt at a joke only making us more aware of how messed up the situation was. Falling silent though, minutes passed by slowly as my human – _Connor_ , I had to remind myself again as he hated it when I called him human, considered what I'd said.

"Alright," he eventually agreed. "After we're done with the mission I'll ask Martian Manhunter to get rid of them….But I think you should talk to Canary about your memories."

Grimacing, I shook my head emphatically. My time there was over and done with, it was hard enough revisiting those nightmare-inducing moments with my human; I would _not_ do it with someone I barely knew. I respected her position as Connor's…..whatever she was. But the woman had been ruffling my fur the wrong way since she and the other adult heroes had found out about my human side with her frustrating persistence in trying to get me to open up.

The psych and physical evaluations she and the others had done on me had sucked _big time_. Hours of testing, annoying questions answered under the scrutiny of the entire team of adult heroes and uncomfortable examinations had left me with a bad taste in mouth every time I saw her stupid face.

"I'm not saying you should try erasing them yourself – I know better than anyone how important the memories you make are, even if they're bad." Connor hesitated a moment before glancing back over at me, his face troubled."You still have nightmares too."

Not wanting to talk about it anymore, I compromised. "I'll think about it."

And I would. I couldn't refute that I'd woken upmore than once in a cold sweat overmemories replaying themselves in my head while I slept, and having to relive them with Connor definitely hadn't helped.

Sighing, I decided to change the subject."I'm still surprised _he_ was willing to let me join you so soon, and on such an important mission at that."

"I don't know if locking you up in a maximum security prison surrounded by killers is trust exactly, but he's willing to give it a try. That's still a good sign," Connor replied dryly.

"I know Green-girl wanted to do it," I mentioned hesitantly. "And with her psychic and shape shifting abilities it probably makes more sense, her powers are more suited to this than mine."

Watching me speculatively, Conner unexpectedly reached forward and wrapped an arm around me, bringing us flush together; his reddening cheeks an endearing accompaniment to the embarrassed scent he was exuding.

"Maybe M'gann would be better," the soothing rumble of his voice agreedin a slightly discomfited tone. "But there's no one I trust more than you to have my back in there."

"I don't like the idea of _not_ being in there with you, but she was right; my instincts around people _are_ still really rough," I reluctantly rebutted. "I'm more likely to attack one of the inmates than buddy up with them."

"That's exactly what we need though." His features furrowed and he paused, a clear sign he was trying to figure out how to phrase what he wanted to say without being hurtful. "M'gann can look and talk exactly like Tuppence, but I think she'd struggle with acting the part of the inmate. You, on the other hand….."

"Acting like a blood-thirsty killer is unfortunately a very accessible skill for me," I cut in, still not sure how I felt about it being public knowledge among the adult heroes. I'd been pardoned for the things I'd had to do there, but it sure as hell hadn't made any of this easier to live with.

Glancing at me cautiously, he nodded. "I'll admit it – as bad as it was for you when you were kidnapped by the Brain, it's going to come in handy when we're in Belle Reve. But Wolf, I have some of your memories." He tapped his temple with the hand not wrapped around me. "And in every single one where you had to hurt or…kill…somebody it was because the Brain forced you to one way or another. Besides," he continued wryly, "I might not have always known there was _person_ inside the wolf I've spent seventeen to twenty-four hours a day with since we rescued you, but all that time together still means you know me better than anyone."

I felt a small twinge of guilt over the past deception, but as always Connor showed no anger over my lies. It was out of character for him, and I couldn't help but find a part of myself always waiting for a sign that he wasn't as okay as he seemed.

Unaware of my thoughts, Connor lifted his arm from my shoulders and ran it through the white-blond hair on his head as he stood up. "We should start gettin' ready," he drawled in a heavy southern accent, a small smirk lifting corner of his mouth. "Do ya still need help from Artemis with the makeup stuff?"

I shook my head. "No, Ah' practiced a lot so Ah'll be fine. There might be a few changes we need to make once we've got the twins and can see 'em face to face, but overall Ah think we're good," I replied in the same accent, appreciating the extra bit of practice before we had to leave for the mission.

Standing up myself, I waited until my human had entered the bathroom before slipping off the shorts and oversized shirt he let me keep under the bed for the times when I forgot to change into a human before coming to his room. I felt my cheeks heat up at the awkward memory of the first few times I'd tried being human around him when my ability to change was still a secret from the rest of the to the concept of needing clothes again, I'd embarrassed him more than once until we eventually figured out a system for preserving my new need for modesty.

"Ah'm going to go change and get ready," I called out quietly before getting down on my knees and changing into my wolf form. Pushing down on the door handle with a swipe of my paws, I padded out as silently as I could. Glancing at the video camera watching the hall, I figured Underwear-man no doubt knew I'd broken his rule again by sneaking back to my human's room last night, but with the mission and our separation at hand, I wanted all the contact with him that I could get.

I quickly went over to the elevator and pressed the button to take me up, hoping no one would be in there when the doors opened. I really didn't want to make things more awkward with the team than they already were by running into anyone.

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 **New Orleans, Louisiana – Historic French Quarter**

 **Day 1**

Connor and I stood ready inside a large warehouse, waiting for the signal to move. I'd expected a call or maybe a telepathic command, but instead we found ourselves dodging debris as our two targets crashed through the roof and destroyed several parade floats being stored inside.

Before I could barely blink away the dust, I was impressed to see Robot-man and Sea-boy tackle our prisoners and smoothly snap metal power-inhibiting collars around their necks.

"Ugh. Ah' don't feel right," the male teen in front of me groaned sluggishly as he unsuccessfully tried to jerk away from his Atlantean captor. "Mah strength…." He raised his voice in disorientedalarm when he barely budged. "But Ah' done jus' gone toe to toe with _Superman_!"

"Congratulations," Connor cheered sarcastically as we came forward to meet the par. "It's certainly more quality time than he's ever given _me_." Deciding now was not the time to comment on his issues with the Kryptonian my partner had been cloned from, I lightly bumped into him; catching his attention.

"Hold still and I'll compare you to see if we need to change anything," I quietly a small nod he stood and silently watched as I studied the two teens carefully, double checking that he'd gotten all the details right and wouldlook as similar to the confused boy next to him as possible.

"His shirt's got a tear on the right side under his arm and obviously he has a few ear piercings you don't," I pointed out. "Otherwise it's pretty uncanny how closely you look alike." Lifting his arm, Connor silently let me make the tear before glancing between me and my silently glaring counterpart.

"Her shorts are rolled up higher and the lipstick is a dark blue, not black like we originally thought," he noted with a frown. "Hand me some scissors and I'll make the holes in your leggings."

Shrugging, I grabbed the makeup bag on the floor and rifled through it before finding the scissors and a shade of lipstick that better matched the girl's own navy hue. Looking at how high she'd rolled up her black shorts, I shook my head and decided not to make that particular change.

"My thighs are too scarred to get away with rolling my shorts up any higher," I murmured, sliding the blue stick over my lips. "It shouldn't matter much while we're in prison, but until we get there my thighs are more likely to tip someone off than the length of the shorts."

I handed the scissors over and carefully fixed the new lipstick while Connor dropped down to his knees and with surprising speed and accuracy began ripping and cutting the black thigh-high leggings I was wearing.

"Somebody tell me what in the _hell_ is goin' on here!" The muscled blond watching us barked; a constipated look of confusion on his face as he glanced between the two of us before looking back at his equally as baffled twin sister.

"It's simple," a familiar voice replied behind me from the shadows. "They're under arrest."

Shuddering at the sound of the clinking metal in his hands; I held myself still, gritting my teeth to keep from growling when I felt the unpleasantly familiar sensation of a metal collar lock into place around my neck. My human shot me a sympathetic gaze and grabbed my hand, lightly squeezing it to show his support. Appreciating the gesture, I squeezed back before letting go; prepared to get down to business.

"Superman and Manhunter are waiting out back to take you into custody, where they'll then take you to the police." Underwear-man glanced over us carefully, his sharp eyes not missing a detail as he went over the plan one last time. "A transport vehicle is scheduled to transfer Icicle Junior and Mister Freeze to Belle Reve tomorrow at four A.M., and if all goes as planned you'll be on it as well. If however something goes wrong and you are not transported tomorrow, then another vehicle will be scheduled to bring you to the prison three days from now. Needless to say, it's important that you leave for Belle Reve sooner rather than later."

Glancing between us and the brother-sister duo standing a few feet away, Underwear-man nodded at the two of us in approval before turning and leading us to our captors.

Following behind, Connor and I quickly made our way into the next section of the warehouse where I saw two familiar adult heroes waiting for us. Taking a deep breath, I glanced at Connor one last time before preparing to be knocked unconscious and sent to prison.

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 **Mount Justice – Briefing Room**

 **One week earlier**

"This past fourth of July there were simultaneous attacks from Mister Freeze, Icicle Junior, Killer Frost, and Captain Cold; all of which were easily apprehended." Pausing, Underwear man shot us a significant look. "Perhaps _too_ easily. Cold and Frost were immediately sent to Belle Reve penitentiary; a federal prison designed to house super criminals. Seventeen year-old Icicle Junior was sent to a juvenile facility and Mister Freeze to his usual cell in Arkham Asylum." Turning toward the screen, the dark crusader brought up police photos of the two men for the team in front of him to see.

"Several weeks ago Mister Freeze petitioned the court to be declared legally sane while Junior sued to be tried as an adult, and as a result both now await transport to Belle Reve; something the League currently believes was the real goal all along."

Glancing over the team, he chose who would participate in the mission."Connor and Wolf; I'm sending the two of you in undercover to find out why."

Stunned, I glanced over at my equally surprised human; the two of us quickly looking back over at the man questioningly. Behind me, Green-girl spoke up.

"Um, Batman? Not to question your judgment, but maybe it would be better if another member of the team accompanied Connor?" Glancing at me apologetically, the nervous Martian continued. "Wolf hasn't been on a many missions, and her people skills now that she's human are still a little…." She trailed off hesitantly, clearly not wanting to offend me by saying what we were all thinking.

"A plan is in place to capture a pair of brother and sister criminals, of which Connor and Wolf in her human form pass a resemblance to," our mentor calmly relied. "Once the criminals have been captured, Wolf and Connor will be sent to Belle Reve in their place to conduct the investigation."

"But–"

"My decision is final," Underwear-man stated conclusively, stopping any further protests from the worried girl.

"Who inside the prison will know of their true identities?" Sea-boy asked cautiously, smelling of worry.

"No one," the dark knight replied. "We can't be certain the prison staff isn't compromised. Connor and Wolf will live, act, and be treated just like any other criminal in the facility."

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 **New Orleans Parish Sherriff's Office – Holding Cell 3**

 **Day 1**

Sighing, I stared up at the grey ceiling and wished we could get going already. Being cooped up in a small cell like this was making me antsy, and while I understood being sent to a maximum security prison wouldn't be much better I still wanted to get a move on with the assignment.

"Hey, baby sis?" A familiar voice called out from the cell next to mine. Glancing over at the stone wall, I stood up and leaned against it, hoping to feel closer to the person it separated me from.

"We're twins," I retorted, playing along. "How many times do ah' have to tell you that ah'm not your 'baby' anythin'?"

A low chuckle rang out, and I knew it was from the brief moment of amusement my human allowed himself over our situation before we had to completely settle into our roles as hardened criminals.

"Ah' was born first by three minutes; if that ain't older then Ah' don't know what is."

"Whatever," I rolled my eyes. "What did'ja want?"

"Do you know what 'Belle Reve' means?" He asked curiously.

Smirking, I nodded my head even though I knew he wouldn't see the gesture. "Yeah, Tom-Tom. It means 'sweet dreams' in French."

"Tom-Tom? An' since when does mah baby sis know French?"

"Ah' don't, stupid," I insulted, enjoying playing the part of annoyed sister a little too much. "Ah' looked it up a while back when Ah' firs' heard 'bout it. As fo' Tom-Tom….well; I'll stop calling you that when you stop lordin' those damn three minutes over me every chance you get."

I heard him chuckle again and I relaxed a bit more, reflecting on my bizarre issue with people's names. It was strange, but names and sometimes new words just weren't memorable to others used it I could understand who they were talking about, but the second I tried to save the information in my head all I could think of was the nickname I'd instinctually chosen for them based on a key trait I'd picked up on.

Green-girl's uncle had taken a look into my mind to see what was wrong and theorized that it was a result of my wolf, and it certainly seemed plausible enough. As an animal there isn't any use for names, we just don't think that way. Instead we recognize and associate by sound, smell, and sight. Unfortunately my brain had rewired;, either when I gained the ability to shift or as a result of living as an animal for so long. Either way the end result was the same, leaving me with the strongly animalistic way of thinking I currently had.

After several sessions with Martian-man, we figured out that the stronger my emotional connection and placement of importance on a person's name; the more likely I am to remember it. With Connor the person I was closest to in our group, it only made sense that his was the first name my brain finally started registering.

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 **Belle Reve Parish – Prisoner Transport Vehicle**

 **October 23 – Night of Day 1**

"Dude," the lanky, white-haired teen sitting across from us stage-whispered. "Dude! Your sister is seriously _sweet_ ,"he flirted, turning to look at me and wiggle his eyebrows suggestively. "How's about you– Ugh!" he grunted painfully, the guard watching us having stepped up and slammed him back against the wall with the butt of his rifle.

"Sit down and shut up," the large man barked with a glare at all of us before walking back to the end of van. I glanced at the tag on the guard's uniform, reading the name 'Wilcox'. Letting out a small huff of amusement I nudged my human and whispered under my breath.

"Look at his tag." Glancing over at the guard, Connor read the name and looked back at me with an expression that clearly stated _so what?_

"It's a fittin' name," I whispered under my breath, knowing it would still be loud enough for the teen sitting across from us to overhear. "Since he seems like kind of a dick."

Connor glanced between me and the guard, looking confused.

"Dude, seriously?" Ice-boy's voice cut in again. "The last part of his name is _cox_. As in, you know, dick?"

"One more word out of you inmate, and I'll shut you up the hard way," the guard commanded, raising his gun threateningly. The teen in front of us immediately shut his mouth with a click and sighed through his nose, looking distinctly annoyed.

Feeling tired, I leaned back and stared glanced at the two prisoners in front of us, mentally reviewing their files in my head.

The names Icicle Junior and Mister Freeze briefly flashed through my head before disappearing again, leaving me frustrated over how hard it still was to remember their names long enough to even try saying them out loud. Two weeks of painful attempts at memorization, and could only recall their names for all of one fucking second?

Seeming to sense my frustration in that strangely attuned way of his, Connor shifted a little closer to my side and glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. Unable to talk, I gave a small shrug to let him know I was fine and let my eyes drift to look up at the polished metal surface of the van unseeingly, trying not to think of all the uncomfortable things we'd have to face once we arrived at our destination. I felt my lips twitch into a small smirk when I remembered how badly I'd wanted to get a move on earlier.

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 **Belle Reve Penitentiary– Prisoner Check-in**

 **Night of Day 1**

We were led into a large, nearly empty room; every visible inch of the walls and ceiling made out of grey concrete. The only variation in color came in the form of three black doors on the far side of the wall across from the entrance. The wall in front of us had a balcony cut into the grey stone, in it a portly black woman in a charcoal pantsuit and white shirt, her ebony hair locked severely in a tight bun above her neck. Cold brown eyes met mine, and I felt a small shiver of unease as I recognized the woman from the personnel files I'd had to review for the mission.

"Welcome to Belle Reve," she greetedcoolly, glancing over each of the gathered prisoners in turn. "In this penitentiary I am the law of last resort. My name is Amanda Waller and I am not your mother, your maiden aunt, or friend. I am your warden; and you….." she trailed off dangerously, "Are to be my prisoners. Some for the next fifteen to twenty-five years; others for life."

Holding up a small remote control, she made sure we all saw it before continuing. "The proprietary collars you wear are custom designed to inhibit your specific Meta strength," she nodded at Connor and me, "And no ice," she turned her attention to the two ice wielders next to us.

"In addition, the collars can and will be used to discipline inmates. A convict who breaks the rules gets one warning." Pressing the button once, the unsympathetic woman watched dispassionately as electricity shot through our collars. Not expecting the current, we all let out yelps of pain at the excruciating attack; breathing heavily when the voltage let up after a few seconds. Glancing over at my human worriedly, I saw him rub at his throat uncomfortably and meet my gaze with a small nod to let me know he was okay.

"Now," the bitch continued. "If order has not been restored after the first shock, the next jolt will render the offender unconscious."

We all tensed for a moment, waiting to see if the woman would activate the collars again. Smirking at our reactions, she continued speaking instead.

"At the slightest hint of trouble this facility goes into lockdown and the weapon systems will activate to eliminate any unauthorized attempts to leave the facility through the exits. If you think you can take a page out of Shawshank Redemption and break through the walls, then think again jailbirds; becauseBelle Reve's walls are thick enough to hold Superman. We know, because we checked."

The warden stared down at us for a beat and I fought to keep from scowling at the threat. Grinding my teeth, I forced myself to hold still when her gaze locked onto mine for a second before moving to Connor.

"Understand this inmates," she stated darkly. "No one has ever escaped Belle Reve. No one ever will."

Falling silent, the warden seemed done with her speech when someone hidden in the shadows behind her cleared their throat pointedly.

"Oh, yes. This," she introduced, "is Professor Hugo Strange. He _is_ your maiden aunt."

I glanced over at Connor uncertainly. What the hell was a maiden aunt?

"Actually," a bespectacled man cut in with a chuckle as he stepped forward; "I'm the prison psychiatrist, and I do promise a _sincere_ attempt at rehabilitation." The man looked to be in his forties, with a tall and lanky frame supporting the black turtle neck shirt and forest green jacket covering him. Smiling in a way that instantly put me on guard, he quickly stepped back to allow our warden to speak again.

"Oh yes, thank you doctor," she replied sarcastically, obviously not impressed with the doctor's earnest vow. "Because as we know, their type is _all_ about wanting to become decent, rule-abiding citizens."

And just as suddenly as it had begun, our orientation seemed to be finished. Two guards quickly marched up to us, carrying orange jump suits in their arms. "Men to the east wall," one of the guards barked. "Women to the west. Face the wall and disrobe down to your underwear. Once you've stripped, place your hands against the wall and spread your legs, we're conducting a pat-down before you change into your new prison suits."

"What about Tuppence?" Connor asked incredulously. "Because she sure ain't changin' in the room with us."

"Oh, shut up," the guard grunted rudely. "I don't care if she's your sister, your girlfriend, _whatever_. Inmates get no special treatment unless they earn it the hard way," he sneered. "Now get moving!"

xXx

* * *

xXx

The process of checking into a maximum security prison built for Meta humans turned out to be uncomfortable and vaguely humiliating. The guards had everyone strip down to their underwear as they'd ordered earlier; what little cloth still covering us getting patted down for weapons. I'd chosen to wear a thong that morning because it seemed like the type of underwear the girl I was pretending to be would don, but now found myself deeply regretting that decision.

It didn't seem to matter to the guard, who'd taken one look at the scars covering my body and briefly paused before silently and somewhat more respectfully continuing with the inspection. After the pat down my bra was taken away for having an underwire in it, and from the furious snarl Connor let out at the other end of the room it was no surprise to realize he'd heard the demand for the piece of clothing.

Staying silent through the experience and feeling surprisingly calm, I quickly changed into my uniform. Within a few short minutes everyone was clothed and made to converge into a line for processing in the next room. As soon as I got close to the men, Connor reached out and grabbed my shoulder roughly, pulling me to him with a glare at everyone else. Mister Freeze seemed somewhat amused by the behavior, while Freeze Junior smelt of a strange mixture of both pity and mild arousal.

We had our pictures taken and a fresh set of fingerprints entered into their database before being separated through the two doors, the men to the left while I entered through the right for the next phase of processing. I briefly mourned not being able to say goodbye to Connor before the separation, but shook it off quickly so I could focus.

When I walked into the room I was met by a surprisingly kind and patient female doctor, who had me undress again before measuring my height and weight and running a few other tests, making sure to collect samples of my skin, hair, and blood.

At one point I had to stand with my arms out and my legs slightly spread while she took pictures of my scars before settling a thick lead poncho-like cover over me to have x-rays of my teeth taken with a device in the corner of the room. Finding myself reluctantly impressed over how in depth the entire process seemed to be, I almost missed her next requirement for the exam.

" _What?_ " I asked, hoping I'd misheard her the first time. Not unkindly, the doctor repeated her instructions.

"I need to check your cavities for foreign objects. Please remove your underwear and bend over the exam table."

* * *

Feeling violated and emotionally raw, I was finally allowed to dress and leave the room fifteen minutes later. Following a new guard, I was led down a long line of cell blocks to what would be my new home until the mission was complete.

" _Wolf, can you hear me?"_ Green-girl's soft voice cautiously echoed in my head. Having known beforehand this would happen around now, I barely twitched at the sudden intrusion.

" _Yes,"_ I answered back, feeling reassured over the knowledge that she and Sea-boy were camping out in Green-girl's spaceship outside the prison.

" _Good, Connor's here with us too."_

" _Wolf, are you okay?"_ Connor asked.

Resisting the urge to nod, I continued to walk behind the guard with a scowl pasted on my face. _"I'm fine, Connor. The examination was a bit…..uncomfortable, but nothing I couldn't handle. How about you? Are you alright?"_

There was a pause before I felt a faint wave of deeply uncomfortable disgust roll through the link. I was surprised at being able to sense the emotion; from what I knew Connor would have had to feel it intensely for it to travel to me like that. Understanding what might have caused the feeling, I wished not for the first time since we'd been separated that I could see him again.

" _They did the cavity search on you too, huh?"_

" _Cavity search?"_ Green-girl asked curiously.

" _You don't want to know."_ Connor and I replied at the same time.

" _Hold on"_ I silently asked the pair when the guard in front of me stopped. " _I just reached my cell and I need to be focused when I meet my new roommate."_

" _You only just got there?"_ Connor asked in confusion. _"Just how long was your examination?"_

" _Way too fucking long,"_ I thought quickly as I was unceremoniously shoved into the small room, the barred door behind me closing with a loud clang.

"You're cutting into my beauty sleep little girl, and if I don't get my eight hours I'm a real _killer_ ," A woman's voice threatened above me. I looked up and saw a pretty woman with violet hair glower at me from the top bunk of the bed, her cold blue eyes narrowed dangerously.

Knowing posturing when I saw it, I shot her my brightest, most friendly smile. "That's good," I chuckled conspiratorially, "because Ah've heard opposites attract. Yah see," I continued, the smile dropping from my face as I shot her a glare, "Ah' have a hard time getting a full night's rest _unless_ Ah've ripped someone's spine outta their still-breathin' body so Ah' can sleep with it like a teddy bear."

" _Woah,"_ Green-girl's shocked voice murmured in my head.

" _She's doing fine,"_ Connor defended.

The deathly pale woman stared at me for a moment, her gaze calculating as she no doubt tried to asses whether I had what it took to back up my words. After several seconds she leaned over, reaching her hand out with a sinister smirk.

" _Guys, you need to be quiet. If I don't do this right I risk being relegated to omega in the prison hierarchy here,"_ I warned my invisible companions, reaching over the bed's railing to meet my new cellmate's hand in a firm handshake.

" _Wait, what does 'omega' mean?"_ Green-girl asked curiously.

" _Shut up!"_

"The name's Killer Frost, but most people just call me Frost."

"Nobody uses their real name here anyways," I casually shrugged. "So jus' call me Terror."

Lifting an eyebrow, the ice-wielder looked at me with a dry expression. "Not the overly imaginative type, are you?"

"It's sure is nice to meet yah, Pot. Ah'm Kettle," I retorted with an eye roll. "Wait, wait. Don't tell me," I pretended to concentrate for a moment before dramatically widening my eyes in surprise and snapping my fingers in an 'ah-a' moment. "Now ah'm jus' guessin' here, but I believe you _may_ have powers related to somethin'….cold. Frost, or even ice maybe?"

Shaking my head, I frowned and looked up at the ceiling speculatively. "Naw, that can't be it. Must be over thinkin' it."

Snorting, Ice-woman shook her head before lying back on the bed. "I do believe this may just be the beginning of a beautiful friendship, Terror."

"You might not be sayin' that when Ah start lookin' for mah new teddy bear."

Hearing a muffled chuckle, I figured I'd managed to be convincing as the sister half of the Terror twins. Sauntering over to my bunk on the bottom, I slid in feeling vaguely confident that I'd past the first test and fit in as a believable inmate.

I let out a nearly inaudible sigh, my body tense as I was all too aware of the murderous villain sleeping above me _._ Fuck, this was stressful.

" _Hey, you still there?"_ I questioned silently. After waiting a minute without hearing anything back, I mentally shrugged and decided to try getting some sleep. I wasn't used to the new place or the lack of my usual sleeping partner, but making sure I was rested enough to stay at the top of my game was important.

My life, and Connor's, would depend on it.

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 **Belle Reve Penitentiary – Prison Cell 13F**

 **DAY 2**

The next morning Ice-woman and I woke up to an annoyingly loud alarm ringing from the speaker system installed throughout the prison. It would seem loud enough to wake the dead to a normal person, but with my heightened hearing I found myself deaf and trying not to let my eyes tear up from the pain it was causing my poor eardrums. Forcing myself to get out of bed, I realized the mistake I'd made too late when I saw my bunkmate was still in bed and watching me with a smirk.

I'd gotten out of bed first, which meant I was also first in line to use the small toilet located in a corner of the cell.

I'd lived like a wild animal for several years, so using the bathroom when others were near didn't really bother me. Trying to pee with someone three feet away and staring at you in an effort to purposely try to make you uncomfortable, well…that was another matter entirely.

Still in the middle of establishing my place in the hierarchy though, I sucked it up and stoically met my roommate's gaze head on as I went about my business, returning the favor when it was her turn. Not my favorite part of the morning by any stretch of the imagination, but the willingness to engage in the power play paid off when Ice-woman shot an approving nod my way before we set off to the mess hall for breakfast.

I was relieved to see us walking side by side, as it meant my new 'friend' considered us to be on tentatively equal terms.

Once we'd gotten our food and sat down, we were soon joined by a large, pale woman with thick muscles and thorn tattoos covering her towering form. Deciding to introduce us, my new purple-haired friend jerked her chin over at the new woman as she lifted a spoon of cold oatmeal to her lips.

"Terror, this is Devastation."

Said woman nodded with a grunt before biting into a biscuit. "Dev's basically the anti-Wonder woman and one of the strongest people I know. The chick with the half-shaved head we passed by in the cell next to us – the one with the evil eye and a nasty attitude is Shimmer. She doesn't have powers, but her brother Mammoth is here too and he more than makes up for it by having both powers and a temper to match. Shim's got decent skills in some sorta martial arts to beat you down if you try anything, but piss off her bro and he'll tear you to pieces. _Literally_."

Nodding, I swallowed the rubbery, overcooked eggs on my tray and outwardly maintained a look of a lazy, almost bored curiosity. Showing too much interest would only make me look inexperienced and eager to please, or worse; nervous.

I joined in idle conversation with the women as they finished their meal until we eventually stood up and made our way to the rec room, where a long glass wall kept the men and women separated from each other but still in view. Seeing a flash of blond hair in a shade exactly like the one I was currently sporting I forced myself to wander over to the glass at a languid pace, hoping once I was there he'd be able to see me. Two men leaning against the glass a few feet away stopped their conversation when they saw me to stare; eventually coming over to hover by and start making crude gestures. Ignoring their antics, I waited impatiently for my human to notice –

And suddenly, there he was. Walking away from the Ice-boy that we'd initially arrived to the prison with, Connor scowled at the men standing in his way and pushed them aside, one even falling over and hitting the floor. It was an excessive use of force Connor wouldn't have normally engaged, but it was quickly becoming obvious that in Belle Reve it couldn't be done in any other way without being seen as a pushover.

I felt both oddly proud at how my human was handling himself and worried over how he was coping with the things he'd have to do to fit in. Feeling better now that he was nearby even if I couldn't touch him, I stared at my 'brother' for a minute, trying to find any sign of injury or discomfort. Glancing up at his face, I watched him check over me with the same worry and couldn't stop a smile from peeking out.

Satisfied that we were both physically no worse for wear, we tried to communicate.

 _You okay?_ I mouthed silently. Nodding he pointed at me questioningly. _Yeah. You?_

Maybe it was because he couldn't hear me. It could've been the personality I'd had to adopt here influencing me, but for a moment I felt bold.

 _I miss you._

His cheeks reddening, Connor rubbed the back of his neck in an embarrassed gesture and nodded, hesitating before answering back.

… _..Me too._

Deciding to ease the awkward discomfort that began settling over us after the briefly emotional exchange, I tapped my temple.

 _When's Green-girl getting in contact?_

Understanding the silent question, he held up two fingers and made a swooping motion with his hand.

 _Two o'clock tomorrow._

I wanted to talk to him more, but what I saw behind my human made me think it was time for us to resume our roles and separate.

 _Look behind you,_ I pointed. Turning, he glanced back only to run off and pull his cellmate out of a fight where he'd been getting the shit beat out of him by a man with a strange helmet on his head. Helmet-man convulsed in a motion I recognized from when our collars had electrocuted us the night before just as his target was taken from him, but as soon as the punishment let up he moved to attack Ice-boy again. As Connor turned around, ready to start fighting back on Ice-boy's behalf the helmet man shudderedagain, his limbs jerking more wildly this time before going still, his body passed out on the ground.

Several of the inmates around them laughed, but outside of that everyone quickly ignored the unconscious man on the ground as they went on with their business. Conner wrapped an arm around the bloody teen beside him, shooting one last glance my way before walking with Ice-boy out of the rec room.

"That your boy?" a voice asked behind me. Startled and more than a little confused over how she'd managed to sneak up on me without hearing her, I stared back at Devastation warily and nodded my head; unsure of how else to answer.

"A little close for brother and sister ain't ya?" she asked with an unreadable look on her face. Sniffing the Amazonian surreptitiously, I was surprised to find there weren't any scents indicating emotion coming from her.

"Mah brother and ah'….well, we done been through some hard times," I begrudgingly admitted. "We're all we each got in this shitty world; hard not tah be close under circumstances like that," I reasoned. Inwardly I mentally frowned, trying to figure out what it was about my interaction with Connor that would have seemed unusually close.

"I heard about your scars. Your brother do that to you?" Offended, I glared at the strange woman, my lips raised in a half-snarl.

"He'd never do anythin' like tha' tah me," I bit back, offended. Simply nodding, Devastation put a gentle hand on my shoulder and regarded me with a surprisingly kind expression.

"The world might not understand it, but we do. Sometimes the love and comfort we need can only be found in the arms of the one person society doesn't think we should be with. If you ever need to talk, you'd be surprised at the number of women here with a similar story and an open ear. Out there in the real world it's a harsh place, but here in Belle Reve we're the last ones that'll ever judge another for wanting – _needing_ something the so-called 'good guys' only judge and keep us from."

Completely confused by the turn the conversation had taken; I nodded dumbly and glanced out at my side of the rec room to see afew sympathetic and evaluating stares being sent my way.

What the hell?

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 **Belle Reve Penitentiary – Prison Cell 13F**

 **DAY 3**

At exactly two pm the next day, I heard Green-girl's voice in my head once again.

" _Hello, Wolf?"_

" _Hi Green-girl,"_ I sighed unenthusiastically.

" _Wolf? What's wrong?"_ Conner asked with concern. _"Did something happen?"_

" _No. Well, sort of. Nothing that should affect the – "_ I paused, realizing that if the rumors circulating the women's side of the penitentiary managed to reach the men, then yes – rumors of our "illicit relationship" could very well affect my human's ability to do his job. Groaning, I turned over on the mattress to face the wall, feigning sleep in case another woman wanting to gossip or oh so subtly evaluate my worth just _happened_ to walk by my cell.

" _Look, Connor…."_ I began awkwardly. " _Some of the women in here saw us, uh, talking. When we were in the rec room."_

" _Have you been compromised?!"_ Green-girl asked, sounding alarmed.

" _Um, well…..not exactly."_

" _Then what's the problem?"_ My human asked uncertainly.

" _My side of the jail seems to think we're romantically involved,"_ I muttered. Grimacing at the silence that followed the disclosure, I waited for my human to speak.

"… _.But we're undercover as brother and sister. Right? I mean, we look really similar and we're called the Terror Twins. I'm not sure how we could have made it more obvious."_

" _Oh, they totally believe we're siblings. They just seem to think we're a LOT closer than the average family."_

" _Oh. OH! Wow, that's – um. Ew,"_ Green-girl remarked once she understood what I was talking about. _"I mean, it's not frowned upon for cousins to occasionally intermarry on Mars – although it's not encouraged. But siblings? Is that a common practice on earth?"_

" _No,"_ I stated firmly. Then I frowned, suddenly aware of how little I really knew about the world. _"Actually….I'm not sure. My initial instinct was to say no, but I actually don't remember whether it's common here. Wolf from the same litter will occasionally mate if there aren't any other worthy suitors. From the way one of the women talked, it sounded like it's at least generally frowned upon outside the prison for humans to do it though. Connor, do you know?"_

" _I didn't think so, but I actually don't know for sure either,"_ My human reluctantly admitted. _"But it's something we should know. M'gann, find out Aqualad what knows."_

" _On it,"_ she replied. After a minute her voice came back. " _Aqualad says that on most of Earth, incest is frowned upon and generally illegal."_

" _This is turning into a very strange conversation,"_ I thought wryly. " _But at any rate, having everyone think we're together has weirdly made things a lot easier on my side. I'm being hounded by sympathetic well-wishers and a horrifying number of women who want to swap stories about their own experiences; I've actually made more progress with the inmates in the last 24 hours with them thinking I'm some incestuous star-crossed lover than if I'd gone with the original plan of sneaking around or trying to work my way into our target's group over the next few days."_

" _You've found something?"_ Connor asked in a disturbed voice, obviously trying to stay on track but struggling with the new information I'd provided so far.

" _Yeah. It sounds like Ice-girl and the others –"_

" _Wait, who's Ice-girl?"_

" _Wolf's name for Killer Frost,"_ Conner explained to the Martian.

" _Sorry,"_ I apologized _. "I worked on memorizing names, but I'm still having trouble remembering them long term. F-frost and the others are planning a breakout in thirteen days,"_ I continued hesitantly, forcing myself to concentrate on the name. " _I don't know specifics yet, but it sounds like they have a plan for taking the collars offline so they can use their powers to bust out of here."_

" _Understood. I'm updating Kaldur on the situation now; it's time to pull you out of there now that we know what's happening."_

" _Hold that thought M'gann,"_ Connor cut in. _"We know when they're planning the breakout but not how. Until we find that out we need to stay."_

" _It sucks, but I agree. We need to learn how they plan to escape or they'll just try again,"_ I added.

After a moment Green-girl responded. _"I don't like it but I understand and Kaldur agrees too. I'll contact you tomorrow at the same time for an update. Until then, hang in there you two."_

" _We will."_

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 **Belle Reve Penitentiary**

 **DAY 10 – Prison Infirmary**

"– _ust Fuck. Fuck my life, fuck this bed, fuck this mission, fuck that presumptuous, self-righteous quack that calls herself a fucking doctor, and fuck that stupid racist bitch and her disgusting– "_

" _Uh, Wolf?"_ Green-girl's hesitant voice popped into my head. Startled, I stopped my internal rant and glared at the clock ticking away in the corner. Fuck, was it two already?

" _Green-girl,"_ I muttered. _"It's good to hear from you again; it's proof that I'm not going to be trapped here forever,"_ I glowered down at the infirmary bed nastily, suppressing the urge to start cursing again.

" _It sounds like I got you at a bad time. What's wrong?"_

" _I pissed off the wrong person."_

"… _Who?"_

" _Andrea Von fucking Strucker, that's who!"_ I silently snarled.

" _You remember her name?"_ Green-girl asked, sounding surprised.

" _I'll never forget it,"_ I vowed darkly. _"Apparently a twin, and apparently 'also' in a fucking relationship with her brother,"_ I hissed with loathing. _"She's the leader of a white supremacy faction in the prison and fucking clinically insane."_

" _What happened? Were you hurt?"_ The Martian asked worriedly. Her concern both surprised and warmed me enough to help me calm down.

" _It's – she tried…..never mind. It's not important,"_ I lied, trying to reign in my fury.

" _Wait, what? Wolf, have you been compromised? Are you in danger?"_

" _No. I got on her bad side so my stay here isn't going to be pleasant, but my life and cover aren't in danger. It's nothing too serious, and it actually helped me find out some more information about the jailbreak."_

"… _..Alright. If you're sure…?"_

" _I am,"_ I firmly replied. " _Have you gotten in contact with Connor yet?"_ I asked, aware that he was missing from the conversation.

" _No, I connected to your mind first today because I've been thinking and I – well, I wanted to know if….are you two – do you….?"_

" _Do I what?"_ I asked, not sure what she was trying to say.

" _I – never mind. This isn't the time; I'm going to get in contact with Connor,"_ she rushed out suddenly.

" _Okay?"_ After a second I felt the small pressure in my head increase.

" _Hello, Connor? Can you hear me?"_ I heard Green-girl ask.

" _I'm here M'gann,"_ my human's voice reassured, sounding tired.

" _Good. Wolf's here too, and it sounds like she has some new information about the breakout the inmates are planning. Go ahead, Wolf."_

" _Most of the breakout will be happening on the men's side of the prison; although I don't know the specifics,"_ I started, getting straight down to business." _And from the way some of the inmates have been talking, it sounds like Underwear-man was right to be wary of telling anyone in the prison about us. When they break out I think they're gonna get help from some of the prison staff – probably guards."_

" _Any idea who?"_

" _Not yet."_

" _I found out some things too,"_ Connor added. _"It's been spreading between the prisoners that a shipment of new uniforms are coming in for us tomorrow, and when they do we need to wear them if we want to survive past next week. I don't know what day yet."_

" _I'll try talking to Ice-girl some more," I sighed reluctantly. "But she's been tightlipped about the whole thing – she won't even talk about info that's already been leaked to the other prisoners. I get the feeling she's the backup in this plan, not one of the leaders."_

" _You're doing well guys,"_ Green-girl encouraged. _"Anything else?"_

" _The new uniforms are probably modified somehow to protect the inmates from whatever they're planning,"_ I theorized.

" _Is there a way we can get you a sample for analysis?"_ Connor wondered.

" _No, not unless Kaldur or I sneak into the prison ourselves,"_ the Martian responded thoughtfully.

" _Not necessary!"_ I thought back forcefully, worried she might consider trying it. _"It would take too long to plan, and the risk is too high when we're this close to the breakout. If you're caught then at best it'll put the inmates on guard; the breakout might even get rescheduled, which means staying lot longer."_

" _We really don't want to do that,"_ Connor muttered. Grimacing in silent agreement, I decided to change the subject.

" _If the guards are compromised then it's possible, even likely that weapons or a means of disabling the collars will be smuggled in too. Any idea when that might happen?"_

" _I checked the schedule and there aren't any other shipments coming into the prison until after the break is supposed to go down. Whatever they're smuggling is either already here or it's coming in with the uniforms,"_ My human answered back, smoothly rolling with the conversation's change in direction.

" _We've got good info, but I don't think we should leave yet,"_ I admitted reluctantly, disliking myself for prolonging the stay. _"We're missing something. If they already have their weapons or whatever they might use to undo the collars, then where's the stash located? Even after the shipment arrives, it'll be a few days before the breakout's attempted, which just increases the chances of the plan being found out before they can try anything, so we need to find out why they're waiting."_

" _What if they have outside help?"_ Green-girl offered. _"There may not be any shipments, but there ARE other services that come into contact with the prison."_

" _Smart,"_ I complimented. _"Also, this prison was built to make it nearly impossible to escape even with powers. How are they going to break through the walls?"_

" _We'll stick around a little longer to find out,"_ Connor agreed. _""M'gann? Did you get all that?"_

" _I did,"_ the Martian confirmed. " _I'll update Kaldur again and we'll run a check on any vendors or services that make contact with Belle Reve. We should also start start checking in more frequently now that we're getting closer to the wire. What times work best?"_

" _Probably morning, afternoon, and sometime in the evening…."_ I suggested after giving it some thought. _"With how soon the breakout's planned for, we'll need to update you on any changes or new information as soon as possible. Maybe ten, two, and six?"_

" _That works,"_ my human agreed. _"Oh, and Wolf; we're scheduled for an appointment with the prison psychiatrist in an hour. Freeze Junior let me know after his session this morning."_

" _It's not another psych evaluation is it?"_ I grumbled unhappily.

" _No idea,"_ came his amused response. _"But at least we'll see each other again."_ A slightly embarrassed pause came after that, and it became obvious he hadn't meant to let that slip.

" _Alright, well, it sounds like there isn't anything else you need to talk about. Right?"_ Green-girl jumped in suddenly.

" _Uh. Well, I guess not…."_ Connor trailed off, taken aback by the Martian's abruptness.

" _Good, I'll contact you again in six hours. Good luck!"_

The connection cut off so suddenly, I couldn't stop a wince at the tug of pain in my head. I shifted back on the bed and sighed, feeling melancholy. The daily 2pm check in between Connor, Green-girl and I usually left me feeling invigorated and less stressed, but today all I felt was mentally exhausted.

Five days in this hell-hole, and it was taking its toll. I had no privacy or freedom, and with the new enemy I'd made today I'd have to watch my back a lot more carefully until I got out of here. I raised my hand and gingerly prodded a cut on my cheek, feeling my lips curl into a silent snarl over the stinging reminder it provided of the woman that had given it to me.

xXx

* * *

xXx

Ninety minutes later, I was halfway through a stressful therapy session with the prison psychiatrist. Connor and I had to sit and play along while the doctor continued his misguided attempts to connect with and help the troubled teens we were playing.

"Here's my concern;" the man began after a short, evaluating pause following the latest string of questions he'd tried asking. "Your antisocial tendencies are a roadblock to rehabilitation. It may feel more comfortable to strictly rely on each other for all the interpersonal needs you may have, but that mindset can quickly become dangerously unhealthy for the both of you and severely limit your ability to cope, let alone enjoy experiencing the world around you when separated."

"Then don't separate us!" I snapped back petulantly, playing the part of the codependent sister.

"Now, now, Tuppence." He tutted, the patronizing gesture sending a real flash of irritation through me. "I've observed some footage of the two of you since you've arrived, and I'm relieved to say you've both shown a surprising ability to adapt to your separation from each other. There were some minor setbacks of course, such as the small skirmish you had with miss Von Strucker, but – "

"Wait, what 'skirmish'?" my brother interrupted, turning to me. "What happened?"

I shrugged, forcing myself to glance away rather than meet his gaze directly. "It's nothin', just some racist idiot that got too big fo' her britches."

"Ah didn't say anythin' earlier 'cause of _him_ ," Connor motioned to the doctor with a jerk of his head, otherwise ignoring the man. "But you got a black eye and a split lip Tup, and Ah'm askin' now. Who the hell did this to ya?"

"Now Tommy, like I said this was no doubt simply due to a small misunderstanding," the doctor stepped in, glancing at me with a conspiratorial flicker in his eyes. Intellectually I knew he wasn't a bad guy, just a well-meaning doctor trying to establish a connection of trust with me, but once again I felt something off about him. Not sure what my instincts were trying to tell me, I pushed forward and grabbed on to the opportunity to move on that he'd provided.

"…He's right," I reassured, looking back at Connor with a nod. "Just some idiot shootin' her mouth off and pissin' me off is all; nothin' Ah can't handle."

Connor looked unconvinced, but the psychiatrist watching us took the cue and redirected the conversation back to the therapy session.

"Now," he began. "I'd like to talk a bit more about the relationship you two have with the rest of your family. Antisocial behavior and the lack of regard for authority figures you've shown in the past can often be traced to a history of growing up in conflict with a parental figure. What was your relationship like with your parents?"

"Neither one of us reallyhas a connection to our parents," I revealed, glancing at my 'brother' warily.

"Interesting," the doctor commented consideringly. "Please, expand on that."

"Or don't," Connor huffed in annoyance.

"Healing requires open dialog, Tommy," the doctor gently chastised. "Go on, my dear."

I shrugged uncomfortably, not sure how deeply I was supposed to delve into the past of the teen I was impersonating. "Not much else to say. Ah' got no idea who Ma and Pa really are."

"Of course ya don't," Connor suddenly piped in with a frown. Turning to look at the doctor, the blond crossed his arms. "Tuppence got kidnapped a while back, and her memories 'fore then ain't really there," he explained. I shot him a glare, not appreciating that he was bringing real-world issues into this, but the blue-eyed Kryptonian was steadfastly refusing to look my way. "What she does remember is mostly from the six months she was gone and – well, it ain't pleasant."

I turned to stare at Connor, feeling an unpleasant mixture of surprise and panic. What the hell was he doing, going off-script like this?

"Oh?" the doctor asked in a surprised tone, glancing between the two of us. "I had no idea; I'm so sorry that happened, Tuppence. If you're experiencing memory loss, then from the sound of it your mind may have blocked off your other memories as a survival tactic to keep from overwhelming you until you could feel safe enough to begin processing what you a traumatic an event like that, it isn't unusual for the mind to protect itself by blocking out all but the necessary memories and thoughts needed for immediate survival. When did this incident occur?"

Grimacing, I clenched my jaw and looked away, ignoring the two of them.

"It happened eight or nine months ago," Connor supplied lowly. I felt his gaze on me, but I wasn't sure it was a good idea to meet it just then. "Tuppence was gone six months before Ah' rescued ….man that took 'er kidnapped others too." Swallowing, Connor finally glanced over at me before saying, "He tortured and experimented on 'em. Made her do things that she had no control over, and sure ain't her fault, but Tuppence still has nightmares an' won't talk to nobody about what that monster did to her."

"Damnit Tommy!" I snarled furiously, standing up. "You know what, _maybe_ Ah' just refuse to live in a _fantasy world_ where every problem's solved in half an hour – you ever think of that?! Ah' survived, didn't I? Ah've made peace with the fact that Ah' can't undo the things Ah' saw and did, and talking about it with a damn stranger sure ain't gonna bring back what that bastard took from me!"

"What did he take, Tuppence?" the doctor asked. Spinning to face him, I sneered at him and slammed my hands on the desk angrily.

"He took _everythin'_ ," I hissed. "Mah' memories, mah body, mah goddamned free will. There ain't a _damn_ day that goes by that Ah' don't look in a mirror and see the monster he made me into. So fuck you," turning around, I flipped my nosy human the bird. "And fuck you too."

"Tuppence – "

"Don't wanna hear it."

Marching over to the door, I tried turning the handle only to find it locked.

"Let me outta here 'fore Ah' rip both your throats out!" I threatened.

"I know this wasn't easy for either one of you, but I truly believe we've made a real breakthrough today," the prison psychiatrist murmured, not bothering to try talking me down. I heard a rustle and a small beeping sound indicating the doctor had turned on his radio. "Mister Wilcox, please unlock the door and escort Tommy and Tuppence back to their cells."

xXx

* * *

xXx

" _Wolf?"_

Stripping off my prison uniform and underwear, I shoved the clothing into a locker before walking over to the showers.

" _Hey. Is Connor here?"_ Turning the nozzle, a cold spray of water hit my skin and my mind briefly flashed back to a small waterfall I'd loved in India.

" _No, I contacted you first again."_

" _Connect him,"_ I requested. _"We really need to talk."_ Almost immediately I felt the small pull in the back of my mind that indicated another person had joined the telepathic link.

" _Connor?"_

" _Yeah."_

" _I'm sorry,"_ I apologized quietly. Leaning forward, I braced my hand against the cool tile on the wall while the water soaked my hair and ran down my back.

" _I know,"_ he replied. _"Me too. I shouldn't have talked to Dr. Strange like that."_

" _You were just worried about me and I didn't handle the situation very well. I wasn't really that mad, I was just trying to play my part. Towards the end though….well. It just hit a little too close to home; I hope I didn't overplay it."_ Rubbing a bar of soap between my hands, I gingerly rubbed the suds over my bruised skin, wincing when I pressed too hard over a cut on my stomach.

" _You guys are in an incredibly stressful situation. I don't know what happened exactly, but it's important to remember you need to rely on each other to make this work,"_ Green-girl commented quietly, sounding troubled.

The sound of several people coming towards the shower room reached my ears and I tensed.

" _You were fine Wolf, Strange didn't look like he thought you were acting. M'gann's right too; we only have to stick around a few more days,"_ Connor tried to reassure; his subdued voice making the words less comforting than they should have been.

" _You guys ARE okay, right?"_

" _I don't know,"_ I quietly thought, immediately cursing myself for the slip up. _"It's fine,"_ I quickly backtracked. _"Prison's just more intense than tv makes it out to be,"_ I joked ruefully, thinking about the shows Fast-boy had made Connor and I watch the week before.

Outside the shower room I heard more movement, reminding me to map out the room in my head in case I had to fight my way out.

" _Sorry to cut this short but I need to go to the bathroom and it's weird if I'm talking to you while I use the toilet,"_ I quickly tossed out when a tall Asian woman walked into the room, her eyes immediately zeroing in on me with an unsettling gleam. I subtly tested the floor with my feet, trying to see how careful I'd need to be of slipping.

" _Oh, uh…..okay…."_ Green-girl slowly agreed, obviously thrown off by my statement. " _Any updates on the breakout?"_

The woman took her time stripping down, revealing the tattoos covering her arms and torso while she continued to keep me in her sights. A black dragon on her right bicep flashed at me, the image similar to one I'd seen on multiple women in the prison.

" _Nothing since this morning,"_ Connor replied distractedly. _"I have to go too, something came up."_

The woman carefully folded her suit and pushed it into one of the lockers before coming over, a small blue plastic bottle clutched firmly in her hands.

" _Okay. Um, Wolf? Any updates before you…go?"_

" _Nope. Bye."_

Green-girl seemed to hesitate a moment before shutting down the connection without another word. I felt a brief flash of regret over treating her so rudely, but quickly brushed it off to focus on what was happening now.

"You that new girl? The one that pissed off bat-shit Strucker?" the woman casually asked in a light Louisiana accent as she walked over, her movements fluid and smooth.

"Whos' askin'?" I replied, shooting her the most intimidating scowl I could muster. Snorting, the woman bent over and placed the bottle on the ground before turning on the shower next to me.

"Someone impressed by the rumors about you," she lightly replied. "My boss's been here about two years now, and she says she's rarely heard so much in so little time about one inmate before. She had me come down and find you – maybe invite you to meet with her."

Stepping under the water, the woman dipped her head back and let the water cascade down her face for a moment, her eyes closed as she let the water soak her hair.

It seemed innocuous enough, but I got the message. By closing her eyes and showing so much vulnerability, she was letting me know how powerful her boss was, and how stupid it would be for me to try taking advantage of her current weakness.

"What does she want?" I asked, pushing my hair back. The woman wiped her eyes and glanced back at me consideringly.

"What all the bosses here want; power and information. The way you handled that crazy bitch's lackeys shows you got power, and being all friendly-like with that roommate of yours means you got info. My boss thinks you've got potential, but you gotta meet with her before she decides to invest. Catch my drift?"

"Yeah, but what's in it fer me? Sounds like yer boss knows Ah can handle mahself jus' fine," I pointed out, scrubbing soap into my hair. The woman snorted and ran a pointed looked down the injuries on my body with a raised eyebrow.

"Maybe you can handle yourself," she agreed amiably. "But no one survives here alone. You may have lucked out by making friendly with someone like Killer Frost, but you ain't allied with her group yet. You got nobody to watch yer back, and with the kind of heat yer gettin', it's only a matter of time before you get worn down and make a mistake."

She stooped over and grabbed the bottle from earlier, pouring a small amount of lilac-scented shampoo into her hands before running it through her hair. I glanced at the bottle's label curiously, noticing it wasn't the standard-issue soap given to us by the prison.

"There's perks to bein' in my boss's group," the woman commented idly while she rubbed the flowery bubbles into her skin. "You can sleep, eat, and shower without one eye open for one thing. You can live the next twenty years of your life here with a family that'll back you up no matter what shit goes down, and you can live with luxuries you wouldn't otherwise get in this shithole." Smirking slyly, she chuckled and watched me out of the corner of her eye. "She can arrange for you to have the occasional visit with that fine brother of yours too….completely uninterrupted by pryin' eyes, of course."

I felt my cheeks heat up at the implication, and used the excuse of rinsing out my hair to avoid having to look at her, though I couldn't escape the scent of her amusement, or of my own embarrassment and discomfort.

"If she wants information, it ain't gonna be fer free," I eventually spoke.

"Naturally," my shower partner agreed. "It depends on what you've got for us of course, but my boss is known for bein' fair."

I shut off the water. "What's she want with mah cellmate?"

"That ice gang's planning a breakout but not leaking any info on just how they plan to do that. See, folks have tried breaking out before but it always fails and leaves the guards feelin' particularly pissy with the inmates for a long while after. We need to know how that ice bitch thinks she's gettin' outta here so we know what side to be on when the time comes."

"You'd sabotage 'em?" I asked, genuinely surprised. My companion shut her own water off and turned to look at me seriously, all playfulness from earlier gone.

"Usually the prisoners and prison staff have an understanding, but life is hell here if the guards are reminded we'd all kill 'em in a second on even a snowball's chance in hell of escape. Inmates that show they ain't gonna cause trouble, maybe even help the guards stop it if others start actin' up…..well, it ain't no coincidence if those inmates don't have to worry about the backlash of the latest failure in escapin' the prison."

We walked back to the lockers and grabbed towels to dry off. "Ah understand it makes life easier here with the guards, but the other prisoners can't like you fer that," I commented.

"Only small fry that can't see the bigger picture. Until now even that ice gang was smart enough to know how things work around here, which is why this sudden plan for breaking out has half the prison believin' they'll actually manage it. If _that_ group's goin' around saying they'll get everyone free, people expect them to fuckin' mean it."

"Yer boss ain't so sure though," I commented. "Why else would ya come to me tryin' to find out more? Maybe instead of getting' _everyone_ free, they just want to use the others as a distraction," I idly pointed out, slipping into my jumpsuit. The other woman paused and looked at me sharply before smiling viciously.

"I knew you'd be a smart little cookie, Terror. It ain't my place to tell you what she thinks about it though; I'm just here to bring you to the boss so she can get a read on you herself."

"Right now?" I questioned, suddenly wishing I'd let Connor or Green-girl in on the exchange.

"Why waste time?" She asked offhandedly, finished with getting dressed herself.

 _Fuck._

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 **Belle Reve Penitentiary – Prison Cell 13F**

 **DAY 11**

The next morning I found myself awake before the morning alarm rang through the prison, having barely slept the night before. Trudging through the usual morning routine with my cellmate, I struggled to hide the exhaustion weighing me down while my usual breakfast companions accompanied me down to the cafeteria.

Sleepily nibbling on my oatmeal, I almost fell over at the chaos that quickly followed.

Alarms suddenly screamed over the speakers and I covered my ears, my eyes watering in pain over how loud sound was; the sound of my spoon clattering to the floor completely overrun when the other prisoners started cheering and hollering as exits slammed closed and the prison guards scrambled around us.

"What's goin' on?!" I shouted at the table over the noise. I felt a shiver of dread shoot down my spine at the wicked smiles my table-mates were now sporting and felt the air around my cellmate suddenly drop by several degrees.

Ice-woman reached up and touched her collar, the metal quickly covered in tiny shards of ice before cracking. Arctic eyes met mine, and I understood the message.

The breakout had begun.

xXx

* * *

xXx

"What's the plan here, exactly?" I asked loudly over the still-blaring sound echoing through the prison as we walked down the hall towards the rec room.

"It's simple, Terror. When water freezes, it expands about nine percent past its original mass," Ice-woman explained, her demeanor turning cheerful when we passed by what appeared to be the dead body of a badly beaten prison-guard. I resisted the urge to grimace and glanced away; desperately listening for any sign of breathing or a pulse as we distanced ourselves.

I didn't hear one.

"When water freezes on concrete, the water expansion cracks and decreases its stability. That's where someone like you or Devastation comes in. My group weakens the walls with our ice; making it easier for people with strength like you guys to come in and punch through it much more easily."

"That's….genius actually," I had to admit as we rounded a corner, only to come across a guard slowly backing away with a rifle pointed at us.

 _Damn it._

"Well, look at what we have here?" My cellmate asked with a smirk.

"Don't come any closer or I'll shoot!" The guard shakily threatened, the gun in her hands faintly trembling.

Ice-woman lazily pointed a finger, shooting a stream of freezing ice over the tip of the barrel. "I wouldn't recommend shooting, or you'll just blow your hands off. Actually," she amended with a considering look, "Go ahead and try. I'm in the mood for a little amusement while we wait for the boys to finish breaking through."

The guard glanced down at her now-useless weapon before throwing it at us and immediately running away at a dead sprint.

Snorting when the weapon missed hitting anyone, our leader waved her hand lazily. "Be a dear and grab her for me, won't you Dev?" she asked the large woman standing behind me.

"I got it," I quickly volunteered, running after the poor woman and tackling her to the ground. Figuring the most painless way to get her out of the way would be to make her pass out, I wrapped an arm around her throat and squeezed.

"Not so fast, Terror. I have a couple questions for little miss hide-and-seek here," Ice-woman cut in sharply as the group walked up behind me.

"Oh god," the woman in my arms sobbed, her nails digging into my arm as she clutched at me furiously. "Please, I don't know anything – I just started three days ago!"

 _What a hell of a welcome,_ I thought with an internal wince.

Cackling, my cellmate punched the guard in the stomach, the force of it ripping the gasping woman from my hold and sending her to the ground before she turned and puked on the floor, coughing harshly.

"Please," the guard raggedlybeggedagain, her face dripping with sweat and tears. "You don't have to do this. I have a family, a little girl…."

Smirking, my cellmate formed a ball of ice over her fist with sharp, deadly spikes growing out of it. "Mmm, beg me some more. It's _much_ sweeter that way," she taunted with perverse pleasure, smelling of legitimate delight.

Feeling cold inside, I looked down at the pleading woman with a terrifying smile and stepped forward, grabbing the front of her uniform. The woman screamed and tried to get away again, forcing me to drag the terrified guard up on her feet myself and shove her up against a wall.

"Maybe ya shoulda thought of yer pathetic family _before_ decidin' to work in a prison!" I snarled, slamming her head into the wall and knocking her out. I held her away from the wall before dropping her, the angle making her landing a little softer and less likely to make her hit her head again.

"Why didn't you kill her?" Ice-woman asked in disappointed curiosity, her weaponized ice crumbling away.

I shrugged."Hostage in case somethin' goes wrong." Chuckling, I sent a dark smile at the other women and cracked my knuckles for effect. "A toy we can play with later if everythin' goes as it should. There's plenty of fun to have 'round here and the way she cries and begs like a little bitch…."

I widened my smile until my teeth showed and looked down at my unconscious victim hungrily. "Ah think Ah'd like to save this one fer dessert….So long as you don't mind o' course," I added in more respectful tone, glancing back at the group.

Grinning widely, Ice-woman wrapped a cold arm over my shoulder. "Why Terror, I find I'm only liking you more and more as time goes on." Turning her head, she whispered into my ear. "You and that cute brother of yours should think about joining us. My organization can use an inspired individual such as yourself, and I'd love the opportunity to get the Terror Twins alone and show them just how _persuasive_ I can be."

Glad she didn't have a sense of smell strong enough to pick up the disgust I felt, I wrapped an arm around her waist and bared my teeth in a vicious smirk.

"Mah dear friend, Ah can't think of anything Ah'd like more."

xXx

* * *

xXx

After the incident with the guard, we quickly finished making our way over to the rec room, where the glass dividing the men from the women was already shattered. My nose twitched at the scent of sex in the air, and I glanced around, my eyes landing on a couple intertwined under one of the tables.

"That's one way to keep busy till we're out," I commented, nudging Devastation to grab her attention. The larger woman glanced at the couple and rolled her eyes in exasperation.

"There's a time and a place. Now's not the time, and this _definitely_ isn't the place," she grumbled, her beefy arms crossing disapprovingly.

"Oh lighten up Dev; we could all use a little fun after this is over," Ice-woman piped in playfully. The larger woman's frown deepened and she shook her head. "Yes, _after_ we've broken out. Not during."

I opened my mouth to reply, only for a familiar voice to interrupt us on the other side of the wall.

"Tuppence, that you?"

Feeling mixed emotions, I turned to look over at my surprised human watching us warily, obviously taking in the situation and trying to decide how much danger we were in. Very aware of the women's gazes around me, I plastered on a smile and ran forward to hug him delightedly. Glad he was following along, I felt him wrap his arms around my waste; his head dropping down until his lips touched the top of my ear.

"Hope you've got a plan," he muttered under his breath. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I kissed his cheek before whispering back.

"Play along."

Letting go, I wrapped myself around one of his arms and turned towards the smirking women in front of us. "Guys," I began proudly, "This is mah brother, the other half of the Terror Twins and dang it if he ain't the best partner in crime a gal could have."

"Aw shucks, Tup," Connor rubbed the back of his neck with feigned embarrassment before dropping his arm and flashing the group a friendly smile."Mah name's Tommy; it's nice tah meet ya'll."

Glancing up at ice-woman, I batted my eyes flirtatiously. "Ah' know we're in the middle of a breakout and all, but Ah think Ah need to take Tommy here down the hall and properly showed him just how nice it is to see him again."

From the sharp scent of embarrassment emanating from the man next to me, I knew the bright red flush creeping up my human's cheeks was in no way faked.

"Oh go on," Ice-woman allowed with an amused roll of her eyes. "If everything's on track my counterparts on the other side of the prison should be able to break us out within an hour and half." Smirking as I dragged my 'brother' past the group, ice-woman called out again as we passed her by. "Just don't take _too_ long or I might have to come back and check in on you."

"Promises, promises!" I called back with a smirk as we turned a corner. The second we were out of sight I stopped and dropped my silent partner's arm, sighing heavily and leaning against the wall.

"What the hell are we going to do?" I whispered, fully aware of how fucking _screwed_ we were. Turning to face me, the half-Kryptonian scrubbed his face, equally stressed out over our predicament.

"I don't know. We can't fight off every single inmate of Belle Reve on our own, and M'gann isn't due to check in for another two hours; the inmates will have long since broken out before we could warn the others. If there's any hope of us stopping this, we _have_ to get the collars back online. Speaking of which," he pointed to the powered down hunk of metal around my neck. "Want me to –?"

I tugged at the collar uncomfortably, but otherwise shook my head. "Gives me some plausible deniability if we get in a situation where someone expects me to use super-strength when I obviously can't."

"The collars are offline," he pointed out.

"Still, just in case. I can try saying mine's still somehow active." I shrugged helplessly.

Nodding, the blond watched me carefully for a moment; his face pale and the deep bruising under his eyes revealing just how much this experience had taken its toll on him.

"Look," I continued quietly, "Some of them have managed to take their collars off, but the majority hasn't. The collars are still the best chance we have of shutting this down in time – we can hold off the ones without collars if everyone else is out of commission. Still, if we can't get the collars back on then we need to have contingency plan."

"What contingency?"

"Ice-woman invited us to join whatever organization she's a part of. It wasn't in the initial mission parameters, but if we can't stop the breakout then maybe we should pretend to join until we can figure something else out."

"Find out more about whoever is helping them from the inside," Connor surmised. I nodded, biting my lip anxiously.

"It's really risky. The Terror Twin's files showed they really are very antisocial and pretty much kept to themselves, but I doubt they managed to avoid running into other villains completely. There's still a chance someone will figure out we aren't who we say we are."

"There's also our powers," the Kryptonian pointed out. "I have Tommy's strength, but while you're definitely stronger than the average human, you're stats aren't going to match up."

"True." I frowned. "But your guy was the flashier of the two; cameras never really caught Tuppence doing too much of the heavy-lifting. We might be able to get away with me using as much of my abilities as I can and maybe just say that I'm the smarts while you're the brawn of our team."

"I'm not stupid," he bit out with a scowl. I smiled and tilted my head at the cute reaction, feeling oddly refreshed.

"I agree; I think you're incredibly smart and your ability to improvise has impressed me on more than one occasion."

"Then –"

"But right now you aren't my hu – Connor," I interrupted. "Right now you're….."

"Tommy."

"Yeah, that guy," I waved off. Taking the amused twitch of his lips as a sign that he'd gotten over the perceived insult to his intelligence, I watched him seriously.

"So, what do you think?"

"You're right," he agreed with a sigh. "If the worst case scenario happens and we can't stop the breakout then we should try to at least find out who's helping them. Just," he let out a deep breath and shook his head. "Let's do everything we can to stop it from getting that far."

"Right," I nodded.

"If most of the concentration's on the main wall, then the control room shouldn't be too heavily guarded. If we can convince Junior to lead us there then we should be able to fight our way into the room and turn the collars back on."

"No powers means they can't break through the wall," I agreed. "But how're we going to get Ice-boy to lead us there?It'll look suspicious if we go by ourselves. I don't want to even contemplate trying to fight our way through the whole prison if we're found out, let alone manage to get there in time to keep everyone from escaping. I hate to admit it, but without him we're screwed."

Connor considered the problem for a moment. "Knowing him, we might just be able to –"

He cut off and we tensed at the sound of footsteps echoing down the prison. It was still a ways off, but we both knew not to take any chances. Reaching forward, I grabbed his uniform and tugged.

"Get over here," I whispered. Looking uncertain, he took a few steps forward until he was standing in front of me stiffly. Rolling my eyes, I tugged at the fabric again.

"They think we're, you know, _together._ Wrap your arms around me and put your face in my neck." Feeling slightly awkward myself, I wrapped an arm around his back, bringing the other one up to the back of his head while he followed my directions. We stayed there for a few seconds only to have the footsteps stop and start going back in the direction they'd come from. Tilting his head back up, we both looked down the hall apprehensively.

"They must not have come for us," Connor commented lowly, twisting his head to look at me. Copying the movement I looked back at him only to find myself swept away in the intensity of his gaze, distantly noting that I could look directly into his eyes without my wolf considering it a challenge. Feeling a soothing surge of warmth in my chest, my eyelids dropped until I was looking at him from beneath my eyelashes, his own darkening cobalt orbs following the movement with a fixated gleam. Off in the distance I heard the sound of footsteps coming back towards us, but instead of distracting from the moment it actually seemed to ignite what was happening between us.

Holding me tighter against him, Connor leaned down and firmly pressed his lips against mine, the kiss surprisingly soft and sweet. Clutching the rough orange cloth of his uniform, I pushed closer until our bodies were completely flushed together and tilted my head up; the motion smoothly deepening the exchange. For a long moment our lips moved against each other carefully until, in a move that both delighted and vaguely surprised me I felt is tongue dart forward and swipe against my own. Granting the access immediately, I couldn't stop a low moan from sliding out of me at the hypnotizing feeling of his tongue sliding over my own.

The footsteps finally reached us, the person behind them inhaling sharply.

"Whoa," we heard a male's voice exclaim loudly. "Dude,that's your sister!"

Breaking apart and breathing heavily, we both turned to look at the surprised Ice-boy gaping at us.

".…Hey buddy," Connor muttered awkwardly, shifting away from me. "We were, uh, just about to come look for ya."

xXx

* * *

xXx

"–So when my dad got a heads up that someone might try stopping the breakout form the inside, he decided to beef up security around the warden's office; even staying in the room himself for insurance," Ice-boy finished explaining as we made our way through the prison; the previous awkwardness from earlier gone after the teen's initial shock over finding us.

"Wait, your pa seriously thinks someone's gonna try stopping this?" I asked, giving him a confused look. "I thought all the guards were locked up or, you know….dead. Who the hell does he think's gonna stop us this late in the game?"

Glancing at me conspiratorially, Ice-boy leaned in to answer. "My dad got word that one of the prisoners on the women's side is some kind of mole; that she's got a deal going with the warden in exchange for a shorter sentence or something. Crazy, right?"

I felt my blood go cold and fought to keep the horror I was feeling from showing on my face.

"Yeah," I laughed it off, almost choking from how tight my throat felt. "That's gotta jus' be some kinda prison myth. Warden's too much of an uptight bitch to ever do somethin' like that."

Except, as I found out last night, she wasn't. Last night I'd been….shall we say _strongly_ advised to join a program created by the governmentand implemented by the warden herself to try reducing the high rate of prison breakout attempts and inter-inmate murders. In exchange for a shorter sentence for 'Tommy' and me, I'd be her spy and foot soldier in the prison; working as part of a small group of female prisoners to keep her updated and the prison a little safer.

It was made clear pretty quickly that refusing her offer hadn't been an option.

"Ah can't believe your pa took a rumor like that seriously," Connor commented, casually pumping the teen for information. "Just how many guys does he have guardin' the office?"

"Thirty," Ice-boy answered with a roll of his eyes. "And it's seriously slowed down the time it'll take to break through the walls, too. It's going to take another half hour, which really puts us under the wire."

Mentally I reeled at the number, feeling my hope for a relatively injury-free day die completely. Seeing Connor's own expression of disbelief and knowing it was going to be nearly impossible to get to the control room now even with Ice-boy unknowingly helping us, I went with the first half-baked idea that came to me.

I caught Connor's eye, mouthing _play along._ Grabbing his hand, I put it on my arm and squeezed the hand around it meaningfully. His eyes widened when he figured out what I wanted to do and he minutely shook his head.

 _Please,_ I silently mouthed. _I need to cry._

Glancing back at the teen in front of us, he grimaced unpleasantly and nodded. _Say when._

Then he squeezed; his grip quickly growing tighter. I found myself wincing when he got close to breaking it, but despite the pain my eyes stayed dry. Seeing this, Connor let go and swallowed, looking down at my wrist miserably.

 _More?_ He mouthed, looking ill.

I nodded and he drew his arm back, his hand closed into a fist.

 _I'm sorry,_ I apologized; knowing how hard this was for him. Forcing myself not to let anything but a gasp out when his fist met my stomach, I felt tears immediately come to my eyes. It was a hard hit, one that left me wheezing and dropping to my knees as I cradled my stomach painfully.

"Tup?" I heard my human croak out, a powerful hit of self-loathing hitting my nose. "Hey, what's wrong?"

"Is she alright?" I heard Ice-boy ask. Breathing shallowly, I looked up with a miserable face I didn't need to fake and sniffed.

"God, Ah – Ah'm so sorry….I never wanted to do it, but she made me!" I cried, looking up at the two of them. "Ah can't lie anymore, not to you; and especially not to mah own brother. The mole you were talking about, it – it's me."

"Wait, you're _actually_ a mole?" Ice-boy asked in disbelief. "That was just supposed to be a rumor!"

"Ah'm sorry….Ah'm so, so sorry," I sobbed.

"Tuppence…." Connor trailed off, sounding shocked. "She would never do this on her own!" Connor defended, playing the protective brother. "What happened? Who made you do this?!"

"It – it was this woman and her gang," I confessed, hiccupping. "She found me last night in the showers; she made me join them – said she'd have me and mah brother killed if I didn't. I was doin' it to save you, I swear!" I cried, clutching at Connor's leg pleadingly.

"Whoa, hey; calm down!" Ice-boy tried soothing, crouching down to put a surprisingly gentle hand on my shoulder. "They threatened your brother, right? I would've done the same thing if they threatened my family."

I looked up in genuine surprise at his kindness, feeling an honest flash of guilt shoot through me at the forgiving expression on his face.

"Really?" I asked, suddenly wondering if my plan was going to fail because I'd underestimated how good a person the criminal in front of me was.

"Really," he confirmed with a nod. "I have to take you to my dad so he can find out what you know, but he's not a totally unreasonable guy. If you explain what happened and give him all the info you've got, I'll personally help protect you and your brother; even if it's from dad himself."

"Wow…." I breathed in awe. "Thank you. Ah promise, I'll tell him everythin' as soon as we get there." Looking around uncertainly, I leaned in. "Ah don't know who, but there's supposed to be another mole somewhere working to stop the breakout. If we don't hurry…." I trailed off nervously.

Connor and Ice-boy glanced at each other, nodding in determination.

"Let's go."

xXx

* * *

xXx

It ended up being a good plan, if I do say so myself. It might've worked too, if one of the patrolling prisoners Connor had helped incarcerate hadn't recognized him, forcing us to knock both him and Ice-boy out just around the corner from our goal.

Panting and feeling desperate at the scant few minutes we had left, if was my human's turn to come up with a reckless idea.

"I'll run and push through them with you on my back," he started. "And once you're in the room I'll fight them off while you reactivate the collars."

I stared at him, not sure if this idea had any real chance of working. "You're not the only one with strength, what if one of them stops you?"

"If we can push through deep enough I'll throw you the rest of the way."

"You're insane." I stared at him a moment, trying to comprehend what it was he wanted to do. There were too many people in there with too many unknown powers, and as much as I trusted Connor, I wasn't entirely sure he'd be able to throw me that far without breaking anything important like the computer we'd need to turn the collars on. Or my bones.

I thought for a minute, but unable to come up with anything that work in the time we had left, I sighed and mentally worked out the obstacles I'd face if I managed to make it to the room in one piece. "This might be one of the least-thought out ideas we've ever had. It's completely psycho that we're actually doing this, but I trust you."

We looked at each other for a second, knowing how dangerous, possibly even downright stupid this would be.

"Ready?" I asked, a part of me almost hoping he'd say no or somehow come up with another plan. Connor swallowed and jerked his head in a hard nod, his eyes revealing the uncertainty he refused to show otherwise.

"Let's do this."

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Author's Note

I really appreciate your support guys, thank you! It took me forever to upload this, sorry about that .

I really had to power through this one. I liked the ideas behind it, but man was it long and had a lot going on in a short period of time. I also have a tendency to jump around the story a lot, where I write chunks of story in different chapters as I get ideas or want hammer out details for the story; so I have stuff written in bits and pieces both in this season, the second season, and even a little bit for a third season of my own creation. Unfortunately this makes it that much harder to make myself sit down and write out one complete chapter, because I'm so used to a more ADD-style type of writing lol.

On the bright side, I already have half of the next chapter done because I wrote that out instead of working on this one :p

Some of you may have detected that I'm starting to change the timeline episode-wise and people's relationships more noticeably. This was done on purpose; I love YJ and I love the fanfics people have written about it but this is definitely an AU story, with timeline and character deviations becoming a LOT more noticeable as time goes on. Is it super necessary to switch "episodes" around like this so much? Maybe not, but it's a lot of fun for me and hopefully makes this a more memorable story for you.

After all, I want what any Fanfic writer wants; to share a different version of a beloved show and hope others like and remember the ideas put forth. I want to relive the joy I got from watching Young Justice that first time around by creating a new version of it for us all to explore.

This AN ran a little long, but thank you for sticking with me so far. I refuse to leave this story unfinished, and hope you'll stick around to see what else I have in store for some of our favorite teen superheroes.


	6. Important Notice

Hey guys, I want to apologize for how slow I am to post. I have a hard time settling down enough to write out a complete chapter instead of jumping all over the place, which has led me to the realization that you'll never see the end of this story if things keep going the way they have been.

With that in mind, I've decided to post everything I've written for this story. The chapters will be incomplete and you might be left with a lot of unanswered questions, but I'd like to leave you with some idea of the story as I continue to slowly work on it.

Feel free to PM with any questions you may have, and I'll do my best to answer them. As I finish a chapter, I'll replace the incomplete content already posted with the finished product.

Thank you.


	7. Secrets

WARNING: This chapter will be particularly all over the place. I ultimately decided to cut all this out completely, but thought I'd throw it in for you with everything else. What's written is the very beginning and the very end of the chapter – but I have to warn you, I decided to go in a completely different direction than what's written at the end.

XX

XX

Chapter planning:

Wolf wakes up in the medical room of the tower with Batman by her side. She looks around for Connor, and they explain that B-man made him go shower and eat, but otherwise he hadn't left her side. They then ask what she remembers last. Wolf explains end of last chapter, up until she was flung into the room, then things get fuzzy.

It is explained by the other person that she'd managed to knock out the main inmate dude and turn the collars on – but that when the collars are mass turned on without the warden's code, the collars are designed to shock the inmates into passing out. Wolf, being the super smart idiot that she is, still had her collar on and was one of the ones to get knocked out.

BIG decision point: Maybe junior freeze decides to help out connor or there's a big showdown and freeze helps wolf out? Freeze would then switch sides, or go into a witness protection type of deal.

XX

"You have a broken wrist and several bruised ribs, among several injuries that appear to be several days old. When the collars came back online there was a flammable substance on your body, and when the collar's electrical function went off –

"It burned the crap out of my neck and chest," I finished hoarsely, remembering the incident with a wince. "One of the prisoners spat this weird slime at us. I thought it was some kind of poison, so I took off my uniform. Obviously I forgot to wipe off the area where my skin was exposed."

XX

"Connor would not have made it in time, but luckily Freeze Junior stepped in and stopped his father from trying to kill you."

I stared in surprise, not sure what to think.

"He knew we'd tricked him though," I stated slowly. "Connor even knocked him out."

Nodding, Underwear-man watched me speculatively. "He knew. But it seems Connor's ability to befriend even the most unlikely of creatures has now extended to the occasional villain. The two seem to have…bonded during your stay at the prison."

I couldn't stop a small smile form popping out.

"Yeah," I agreed quietly. "He's good like that."

The man's face softened a degree and he gave a small nod before sitting down on the chair by the bed, facing me. My smile quickly dropped as an alarming thought came into my head.

"Ice-boy can't stay there," I stated; a thrill of fear going through me for the teen. "It doesn't matter how closely they keep an eye on him – it might even be already too late. I can't stress this enough, he _has_ to be moved immediately for his own safety."

XX

"Wolf," Connor's voice whispered from the door way. I'd heard him coming, but it hurt too much to turn my head and look.

"Connor," I greeted with relief as he came over and grabbed one of my hands. "You okay? Sounds like some stuff went on after I passed out."

"Me?" Connor snorted. "You're the one with burns and broken bones."

"I couldn't exactly do it at the prison, but all I have to do is shift and the worst of this will be gone."

Connor frowned. "What are you waiting for then?"

"Underw – uh, he and I were having a conversation. The others told me it was rude to shift or go naked in front of other people," I replied, hoping the masked man next to me hadn't caught the slip up. From the minor twitch in his face, I figured he knew what I'd been about to call him.

"Wolf, it's fine to let me or the others know if you need privacy in order to shift to your wolf form, especially if it would aid in your healing," Underwear-man cut in. "No one would fault you for that. The issue the team had was….."

"You can't be naked in front of the others," Connor interrupted. I smelled small hint of embarrassment from him before he quickly amended himself. "Us, I mean. You can't walk around naked in front of the team. Or the League."

Looking cutely flustered, Connor scowled to cover up his embarrassment. "Just keep your clothes on unless you're showering."

"I know, I know," I huffed, rolling my eyes. "Shift when others aren't looking, Wolf. Don't eat food off the floor, Wolf. No nudity, ever. Wear a bra, wear underwear, don't eat with your hands. Stop cursing so much, incest is illegal, don't growl when someone tries to steal the remote, you can't play fetch anymore because it's "weird" now – humans seriously have to live with a lot of rules," I complained, suddenly feeling frustrated.

"I did okay in the prison, didn't I?" I asked the pair. "I've listened to everything you keep telling me, so I'd appreciate it if you stopped treating me like I don't have the intelligence to remember all your stupid rules. I've been living here for months and seen the way you act. Trust that I'm doing my best to respect and follow the rules you live by."

XX

Ideas for this chapter:

The legend says the sword can only be wielded by the pure of heart. Harm or whatever his name is thinks it has to be pure good or pure evil, but what if it has other meanings? Like being purified (in general) or purified of a specific thing or substance?

XX

Update: The above idea is crap. I've now moved on to the sword being connected to wolf somehow, with her connecting to it.

XX

Maybe the sword is an ancient relic and resonates with a member of the team (lol like wolf maybe?). The sword, when united with a proper master, stays with the person until death. It can be sheathed in the person's arm, kind of like a subspace thing. In death the sword stays attached to the arm until another worthy master finds it.

Update: Fuck this, doing the above would just over power Wolf. Instead of focusing on this, maybe ignore this "episode" all together or just focusing on the idea of Connor taking Wolf to the Halloween dance and the shenanigans that happen from there.

The sword was inscribed with Runic letters, which blazed in time of war, but gleamed with a dim light in time of peace.

I glanced down at the weapon uneasily, fighting the strange, growing urge to grab it.

"Wolf, what's wrong?" Someone asked, the voice sounding distant.

XX

"I don't know where anyone got the idea for this purity or 'beowulf' crap," I muttered with a frown, holding up the sword curiously. "Trying to force a connection by using weird backdoor magic like that is only going to make the sword's power unstable and put an intense strain on the user."

"What?" fast-boy asked, glancing at me curiously.

"I can't explain how I know exactly, but….this sword is physical proof of favor from a god," I explained. "The scabbard of the sword – the arm – belongs to the last master. It shows that the sword can't truly be separated from its chosen owner; even in death."

"Wolf, wait;" Robin cut in. "We don't understand what you're saying."

"The way the sword operates is a symbol of the loyalty shown to the god," I clarified with a roll of my eyes. "It's a reward when someone shows devotion to the patron god, or honors a deal or contract made despite it costing the person a lot to uphold it."

"Wolf, you're not speaking English!" Fast-boy cut in, sharing a glance with the others. "Can she even understand me?" he asked, pointing at me. I glared, bringing the sword down to my side.

"I can understand you just fine, what's wrong with you?"

"…I believe that while we cannot understand the language Wolf is speaking, Wolf can understand what _we_ are saying," Sea-boy clarified hesitantly, looking at me. I frowned, suddenly unsure of what the hell was going on. I was speaking English, right?

"Wolf – if you can understand us, put the sword down. You started speaking in a different language when you picked it up," Robin spoke slowly, glancing down at the sword cautiously.

I nodded and turned to put the sword back on the table when I paused, seeing the shriveled hand wrapped around the sword twitch, the grey fingers spasming. I tried lifting my fingers off the hilt to drop the artifact, but found my fingers were completely glued to the thing.

"Guys –!" I called out in alarm, trying to shake it off with little success.

"Help her!" Connor called out, and I heard the others move towards me.

"Stop! Don't touch it, you might be affected too!" Robin warned.

"Oh god," Artemis gagged.

I nodded with a grimace, agreeing with her as I stepped away from the dismembered arm. A strange compulsion to look down at the sword came over me and I lifted it curiously, watching in amazement as letters faintly etched into the metal began to glow a soft red. I read the inscription, my mind immediately translating the name inscribed there. _Angurvadal,_ I read, feeling an odd sense of deja vu.

 _The Torrent of Anguish…..a blessed sword to aid the cursed,_ something in my mind whispered. _A gift to achieve victory in the battles of a war that can never be won._

This sword felt oddly…..familiar to me. Turning over, I read out loud the poem I knew would be inscribed on the other side of the blade.

" _An ally for you, with resolve of stone_

 _When battle is nigh and enemies have grown._

 _To remind you when the battle is fought,_

 _And when to rest; ready or not._

 _A call to arms forevermore,_

 _To you, who fights an endless war._

 _If it is evil that you seek to stall,_

 _Then call my name….call Angurvadal!"_

Not knowing what was going on but deciding to follow the instincts telling me to roll with it, I watched as the – runes – not words I suddenly realized, glowed brighter. A movement caught my attention out of the corner of my eye, and I looked over at the dead arm on the ground only to see it dissolving into a dark grey dust.

I heard someone gasp and glanced back over at the team.

"Tell me I'm not the only one freaked out by this," Fast-boy stated, staring between me and the dissolving arm in distress. Everyone nodded except Connor, who looked torn between forcibly ripping the weapon out of my hand and trying to defend me from the others.

"Am I speaking English yet?" I asked, hoping my sudden change in language wasn't permanent. At the blank stares sent my way I sighed, feeling frustrated. Wanting to put the weapon in my hands away so I could have time to process whatever was happening, I tried letting it go again with the same result as before.

Growling, I stared down at my new attachment and thought for a moment, trying to figure out –

 _Wait. What if I…?_

Thinking back to the way the dead arm had held the sword, I held up my left hand; aiming the tip of the sword towards my palm.

"Wolf, what are you –?" Connor cut off, staring wide eyed with the others when the sword painlessly slid through my hand, disappearing completely when I pushed the hilt through too.

"Okay, _now_ I'm gonna barf," Artemiscommentedin a strangled voice.

"What – I mean, _where –?_ " Fast-boy muttered incoherently, jabbing Robin in the side with his elbow frantically.

"I think he – _we_ – all want to know where the ancient evil sword just went," Robin translated, looking just as shocked.

"In her arm," Artemispointed out obviously, swallowing. "Wolf just put a sword _insideher arm_."

"Subspace storage pocket," I answered, feeling disconcerted by the sudden knowledge. "It's intangible, but stays tethered to the material world by using my energy as a power source until I call on it."

"You're speaking English again!"

"How do you know this? Wolf, what is happening?" Sea-boy asked, visibly struggling to jerk his eyes from my hand to look at me fully.

"Uh….Angurvadal told me," I muttered, shifting awkwardly.

"We heard you say that several times," Robin chimed in. "Who or what is Angurvadal? Was the sword making you talk like that?"

"Angurvadal is the sword," I replied, clenching and opening my hand to see if it felt different.

XX

XX

I shook my head. "That's…that's not right."

"What do you mean?"

"Spirits….they wouldn't come to our plane for something small like that."

"I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty pissed if my own brother murdered me _then_ covered up the evidence all so he could get his hands on some mystic sword."

"No," I argued vehemently. "Spirits don't care about that stuff once they've crossed over! It's – if they're sent over here it's meant to be an omen, a warning of terrible things to come. Sure, maybe the girl used the solving of her death as the means to do that, but it's not the _point_."

"Where the hell are you getting this? You weren't even there!"

I felt strange, and my head started pounding with the beginnings of a migraine.

"Something awful is coming, something that was deemed so catastrophic that a fucking _spirit_ of all things was sent to warn us," I muttered, not sure where this knowledge was coming from. A weird sense of déjà vu hit me and I stepped back, feeling dizzy.

"Wolf, are you okay?"

"Secret. She said it would be a secret," I muttered, holding my head to ward off the pain. Someone grabbed me from behind, prompting me to realize I'd started falling.

"Time is different for them, so it may not happen for months, maybe even years….But whatever the secret is, if we don't find out the truth then terrible calamity will befall the mortal plane and all will be lost."

I tried to blink away the darkness only to suddenly find myself in a forest covered with mist. I glanced up and gasped, feeling all the memories of my past come back to me with a snap.

"Wolf spirit," I greeted grudgingly, dropping my head down in submission to the enormous grey canine in front of me.

" _You forget and yet still do not to forgive,"_ the wolf replied with amusement, his gruff voice echoing in my mind. I snarled at the ground, my fingers digging into the cool dirt beneath me.

"I sacrificed and suffered more than you will ever know," I hissed back; my mind reeling with the knowledge of what I'd experienced since coming to Earth. "Did you know what would happen to me when I agreed to pay your price? Do you have any idea what I went through, losing my memories and living on a foreign world like this?!" I roared, my eyes blinding me with hot tears.

XX

XX

"I've paid my debt ten times over and will continue to do so because you failed to fulfill your end of our contract!"

" _There is little time to speak, young one. Do not let your rage decline the favor owed to you,"_ The wolf sprit gently chastised, his gold eyes calmly studying me.

Hating myself, I nodded and grit my teeth before sitting down to listen.


	8. Schooled

WARNING: In this chapter, it was basically Wolf going to school for the first time. There's some stuff at the bottom about Wolf going to history class and the stuff she learned there, but I don't think I'll ultimately keep it in the final draft.

XX

XX

"I want man-boy to be my guardian."

"No."

"I'd love to!"

Pausing to briefly look at each other when they'd spoken at the same time, Underwear-man quickly turned back to me and shook his head.

"Captain Marvel can't be your guardian when he himself still needs one." Looking over at the masked man pleadingly, my friend clasped his meaty hands together beggingly.

"Aw, c'mon Batman! I'll make sure she's fed and gets plenty of water, and I'll take her on lots of walks and play fetch with her everyday so she gets good exercise."

I shrugged, liking the sound of it. "Sounds good to me."

"Marvel, Wolf is not a pet." Turning to me, underwear-man repeated himself and I got the feeling that he was narrowing his eyes dangerously behind his mask. "Wolf, you are _not_ a pet. As a minor you require a guardian to show up for school events or medical emergencies when needed and Captain Marvel cannot do that when he himself still goes to school."

"The only time he'd even be needed is to sign that paperwork stuff and mail it back to the school! He never even has to physically be there," I argued, my wolf fueling the aggression I was suddenly feeling when the ridiculous-looking human in front of me wouldn't back down.

"If you're injured or get sick he'll be the one they call to come get you."

"I don't get sick and if I'm injured then I'm sure as hell not sticking around for the humans to find out about it!" I retorted, a small growl accompanying my words.

"It's a matter of legality, and since Captain Marvel cannot legally be your guardian you'll have to choose someone else," Underwear-man said with an air of finality. Annoyed as hell but still rational enough to understand his point, I nodded stiffly before looking over at my friend.

"You can be my guardian in everything but school," I promised. "I'll still go on walks and play with you man-boy, and when you visit you can feed me."

Shooting his hands in the air excitedly, the man whooped and came over to wrap an affectionate arm around me. His crushing strength made it a little harder to breath, but my wolf just considered it a pleasant reminder that he was strong enough protect himself around danger.

Underwear-man sighed but simply nodded his head. "Very well. Now, do you have a preference for who else will be your designated school guardian, or would you rather I choose for you?"

I considered my options carefully. "Robot-man can't do it, can he?"

Another sigh, this one more annoyed than weary. "No."

"Damn."

"Wolf! You just swore." Man-boy shook his head in disappoinment, a child-like mirth in his eyes as he wagged a finger at me.

"Sorry man-boy," I apologized distantly, still mulling my options. "I'll try not to as much."

"Good girl!" He praised, scratching the top of my head. _Damn that feels good,_ I admitted to myself, slightly leaning into the motion.

"Well, can I share a guardian with someone else on the team?" I eventually asked, not wanting to be put in the care of some stranger. Nodding, underwear-man pushed his cape back.

"Take the day to think about it," he recommended. "Talk to the others and find out who you would feel most comfortable with."

Without waiting for a response, the intimidating man turned and walked out of the room in the direction of the elevator.

"Maybe you should choose Batman," Man-boy offered. "I know he acts grumpy sometimes, but he loves Robin a lot and he's really responsible."

"I know," I agreed. "But I think he takes on too much of the world already, Man-boy. He takes himself and the world around him too seriously, and I see how that mindset's affected masked-boy. He's a natural leader, I'd even say an alpha if he had more of the wild in him, which is in part why it probably wouldn't be a good idea to choose him."

"Because you'd want to fight over who's in charge?"

"It's a little more complicated than that, but yeah."

"Hmm….Well, if you want someone from the team then there's the Flash – Wally's mentor. Superboy's is Canary, Miss Martian has her uncle Martian Man Hunter, Aqualad has Aquaman, and Artemis has her uncle Green Arrow."

"I don't really know green-girl or sea-boy's mentors," I considered thoughtfully. "And I don't like psycho-woman. I don't –"

"Wait, you don't like Canary?" Man-boy interrupted curiously, his blue eyes wide.

XX

XX

"Are you a cop?"

Blinking, I glanced over at my self-proclaimed "new friend".

"No," I replied, confused. "Why do you ask?"

She shrugged, a disbelieving look crossing her face.

"I noticed it pretty quickly; you act a lot like my dad, who's a cop. You could be doing one of those 21 Jump Street things and be like thirty, but look like a highschooler. Maybe you're"

I nodded slowly and opened my lunch box, not sure what 21 Jump Street was or why she thought I might be thirty but too hungry to put off eating in order to find out. Ignoring the look of distaste she sent my way when I dug my fork into a piece of the rare steak I'd pre-cut that morning, I chewed the tender beef with relish.

"Are you a vampire then?" She asked lightly, digging into her own brown paper bag to retrieve her own lunch.

"Yeah right," I snorted, rolling my eyes like blond-girl had taught me.

"How about a psychic detective? Quick, try to guess what I have for lunch."

"I have no idea. A sandwich and chips maybe?" I asked, knowing full-well what was in there. I could tell by the smell wafting from the bag that there was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on wheat bread and a slightly overripe orange, but knew human noses probably couldn't have picked that up from where I was sitting.

"Ooh, so close! You got the sandwich part right, but the side dish is….." She tipped the bag over, letting a sandwich and peeled orange wedges in a plastic bag fall out.

"Damn. I guess you can cross werewolf off the list too, huh?" I noted dryly, hoping the comment didn't sound too forced or out of place.

"Guess not," the blond sighed with mock woe.

"What's with…." I trailed off for a second, trying to remember the term blond-girl had taught me. "…the thirty questions?"

The teen glanced at me oddly, an eyebrow cocked in amusement.

"You mean twenty?"

"You're asking so many, I thought I'd bump it up to thirty." I shrugged, brushing off the mistake. Grinning, the girl chuckled and popped one of the citrus wedges in her mouth, swallowing quickly.

"Sorry, I was just curious. It's the little things, y'know? You chose a table against the wall just now even though a bunch of open ones in the center were closer; you did the same thing in class earlier too. Not a big deal on its own, but you keep an eye on the doors almost constantly. No matter where we are or who you're with you've got this hyper awareness of people. Every time someone even _twitches_ , you get into this defensive stance and look ready to attack."

Studying her curiously, I watched as she visibly forced herself to hold my gaze steadily.

"I don't think you do it on purpose, but there's also that intimidation thing you do with your eyes."

"What intimidation thing?" I asked, silently acknowledging that yeah, _maybe_ her refusal to back down from the staring contest was rubbing my wolf instincts the wrong way.

"You're doing it now," she laughed, finally looking down to her sandwich. My wolf, satisfied that I'd won the small dominance challenge, settled down enough to let me glance back at my own food.

I opened my mouth to yawn, suddenly feeling a little sleepy, but my companion waved off what she must have thought would be an apology.

"Don't worry about it," she smiled sympathetically. "I doubt anyone else's noticed; I'm just more aware of stuff like that than most people because of my dad."

Her tone felt oddly condescending, but I suppressed a grimace and nodded silently, finishing the last of my food quickly.

"Anyways, what classes do you have left?" She asked, bunching up her garbage and tossing it back into the bag for disposal.

"P.E. and History," I answered back contentedly, glad I'd be able to work off some of the anxious energy that had been building in me since my arrival at this god-forsaken hell hole.

"Ugh, sorry to hear about that, P.E. sucks," my quasi-friend replied, scrunching her face with dislike. "I have it during fourth period; I heard we're being tested on how fast we can run a mile. I'm _so_ out of shape, it took me like thirty minutes to do it last time."

I stared at her in horror, my mouth dropping open. "Thirty minutes?! How – you should be able to run seven or eight miles in that time!"

"Right," she snorted, thinking I was joking. Realizing my faux pas, my jaw snapped shut and silently I stood up with her, following as she walked over to a trashcan and threw away her garbage.

"As long as you finish in under an hour, you won't fail," she consoled as we walked out of the cafeteria. "And even if it takes longer, they _still_ won't fail you; they just make you do it again next time, which kinda sucks too I guess, but still." She patted me on the back when we reached my locker, my fingers quickly turning the knob on the combination lock to reach the gym clothes inside.

"I'm sure you'll be fine. Let me know how it goes!" she called back, walking away to find her own locker. Sighing, I grabbed the long-sleeved shirt and sweatpants balled up in my backpack and closed the locker door carefully before walking down the hall to the girl's changing rooms I'd seen earlier.

Quietly slipping in, I ignored the curious glances of a couple girls that had already arrived and headed straight for one of the bathroom stalls. I didn't really care if the humans saw me change, but green-girl had explained that it would be better to hide my scars and tattoos whenever possible. I couldn't help but glance at the short sleeved shirts and shorts the other girls were wearing longingly, but quickly closed the stall door and changed into my own version of the uniform.

Tying my hair into a low ponytail, I followed a pair of girls as they walked out an unfamiliar door and saw that it led to a small gym where a few boys and an older man in a tracksuit holding a clipboard were idly chatting.

"You the new student? Wolf.…" He checked the clipboard and looked back up. "….West?"

I nodded, pushing the grey sleeves of my shirt up to my elbows.

"Huh," he commented, raising an eyebrow with interest. "Interesting name. Would you rather I called you Wolf or West?"

I thought it was a weird question but shrugged it off and studied him curiously.

"Wolf."

Nodding, he scribbled something on the clipboard before glancing back at me. "It's not ideal with it being your first day and all, but today I'm having the class run a mile around the track outside. One run around the track is a quarter mile, so do four of those then come up to me so I can write down your time. Ideally you'll finish running the mile in under an hour, any longer and I'll have you try it again next class. Understand?"

I nodded disinterestedly, already knowing most of the information he'd provided already.

"Alright," he nodded back. "Go ahead and start stretching, once the bell rings we're heading out to the field."

Turning, I walked a few feet away and bent over at the waist to touch the floor, relishing in the light burn of the stretch in my legs at the motion. I felt several eyes on me, but my anticipation for the run made it easy to tune out the attention as I stood straight again and slowly rotated my feet to stretch and warm my ankles. Over the next few minutes the rest of the class trickled in, one or two faces vaguely familiar from my math and English classes.

As soon as I heard the whistle, I shot off exuberantly, welcoming the slap of cool air against my face as my legs furiously pushed off against the soft synthetic material of the track. I heard three others following behind me closely, one almost neck to neck with me, but I ignored them easily as we finished the first lap and quickly passed the classmates jogging around us.

As we finished the second lap, I saw the male keeping up with me shoot a challenging glance my way before he started running a little faster until he'd almost surpassed me. Growling, I accepted the challenge and pushed myself to go faster, a small grin breaking out on my face at the incredulous look he sent my way as I pushed ahead of him again during the third lap. By the final lap I finally started to feel my heart begin to pound a little harder with the exertion and I slowed to a jog once I'd reached the finish line in first place.

 _Not that it was a competition or anything,_ I thought smugly, walking up to the coach. Looking impressed, the man nodded and recorded my time on the sheet, quickly doing the same for the three people I heard following behind me. Quietly sniffing, I reeled back and stared at the face mirroring the surprise I was feeling and stepped back warily, my instincts on high alert.

"That was pretty impressive Wolf," our teacher complimented excitedly; unaware of the danger he was in. "It takes some serious work to reach a four minute and forty-three second mile, were you on the track team at your last school?"

"No," I answered shortly, refusing to take my eyes off the dangerous…..creature…..next to me.

"Well, with national level speed like that I think you should definitely think about trying out for the team here!" the man smiled encouragingly, placing a hand on my rival's tense shoulders."Kyle here is on the team, I'm sure he wouldn't mind answering any questions you might have," he looked down at the boy pointedly, and the teen nodded slowly, his amber eyes never leaving mine.

"Yeah," the boy murmured lowly, walking around me as he kept his gaze trained on me. "Let's go…..talk. I'll tell you all about it."

Stiffly nodding, I walked with him silently until we were behind the bleachers and my lips lifted over my teeth in a silent snarl.

"What the fuck are you?" I growled, going into a defensive stance.

"I should be asking you the same thing _bitch_ ," he snapped back, his eyes narrowing dangerously as his body dropped to mirror mine. My mind racing, I barely suppressed the urge to turn into a wolf; the last thing I needed was for someone to come across a giant wolf attacking a seemingly human student on the school field.

"Why do you smell like wolf?" the teen demanded, his nostrils flaring as he sniffed me again. Growling low in my throat, I fought off the prickling in my jaw and shook my head violently, my chest heaving with the effort to keep myself human.

"Does it matter?" I grit out, feeling a drop of sweat slide down my temple. "There's only one way this ends, _wolf_."

His pupils dilating, he smirked. "One of us kills or fucks the other. Guess which one I'm hoping for?"

"I already have a mate!" I spit out angrily as we circled each other.

Huffing, he followed me step for step, his eyes not missing a single detail as he watched me carefully. "Funny, I don't smell his claim on you," he taunted.

Snapping my teeth threateningly, I opened my mouth to retaliate when he launched himself at me with a growl, his eyes trained on my neck.

"You're delusional if you think you can make me submit so easily," I barked, taunting him. "And even _if_ you won, you can't exactly fuck me right now with your classmates on the other side of the bleachers."

"Screw the humans," he tossed back cagily. "I've finally found another wolf, and it's a female my age no less. _When_ I make you submit, I'm staking my claim and making you mine; I don't care if I have to do it in front of others the first time around – _nobody_ is going to get in the way."

"We shouldn't do this at school," I replied slowly, frowning in confusion. _Wait, why shouldn't we do this now?_

"You're _not_ escaping," Kyle growled, taking a step towards me.

"No," I shook my head, disoriented by how…. _human_ I was suddenly feeling. "I have a mate. He's not a wolf, but I wouldn't have chosen him if he couldn't match or surpass me; and he's just as much an alpha as we are."

"I – whoa," he muttered, standing up straight and blinking. We stared at each other for a few seconds, the aggression we'd been feeling dissipating as quickly as it had initially arrived.

"What the hell?" I asked, confused.

"Mari," he replied, his face dawning with comprehension as he glanced around cautiously before settling back on me.

"I – I don't feel like a wolf anymore." I grimaced at the alien feeling of being completely cut off from my lupine half. "What the fuck just happened, wolf?" I demanded.

"Whoa, hey, it's okay!" He soothed, holding his hands out. "I have a friend who can neutralize the natural predator and prey instincts in animals. She must have sensed our aggression and temporarily cut off the connection to our wolves."

"How long does it last? Can I still turn back into –?"

He shook his head and rubbed his arms uncomfortably as if the loss of his wolf made him just as anxious. "She won't keep it up very long," he promised. "Probably just until I see her next period and explain what happened or until school's out."

"I'm so sorry for the way I acted," Kyle apologized, his eyes flashing with emotion. "I can't believe I almost tried to – to _force_ you. I – I can't even…."

"We both got…..caught up in it. We reacted the way wolves would." I shrugged, vaguely horrified by how swept up I'd become in my instincts and immensely grateful for this Mari person, whoever she was. "It's – running into another wolf like this, into another _alpha_ of all things in the same territory, the only things our wolves would have allowed would be to either mate or kill each other."

"Jesus," the teen muttered, running a hand through his hair.

"Can you really become a wolf?" I asked, still feeling wary. Cocking his head, the brown-haired male paused and regarded me carefully before nodding.

"You?" he asked.

"Yeah. It happened a couple years ago, I don't remember how or why exactly."

"Hmm…." He hummed curiously. "I was kidnapped and injected with some sort of serum when I was twelve. It was a part of some sort of child-soldier program some crackpot was trying to put together. A couple friends and I were able to escape, and we haven't seen him since."

XX

BASICALLY, MARI SENSED THE MAJOR AGGRESSION AND USED HER POWERS TO SUBDUE IT. KYLE EXPLAINS SITUATION, AND HE AND WOLF AWKWARDLY PART.

XX

"How was your first day of school?"

Growling, I dropped my bag on the couch and marched into the kitchen, opening the door to my designated cupboard and grabbing a frisbee.

"I hated it, sea-boy," I declared firmly, overwhelmed with everything the day had brought. "Teenage boys don't shower enough and they reek unendingly of desperation and arousal, teenage girls put on too much perfume and go through a thousand different emotions a minute, and everything except history is boring _."_

Unsure whether or not to mention the strange wolf-boy I'd fought earlier, I uneasily shoved him out of my mind.

"I….see." Sea-boy stood up slowly, his lips twitching into a small smile when he saw the blue disk in my hands. Standing tall, I shoved down my embarrassment and looked at him directly, holding up the plastic toy.

"Will you, uh….play with me?"

"It would be my pleasure."

Nodding, I walked with him to the elevator, entering and pressing the button to go down to the ground floor when the doors opened.

"What did you enjoy about history?" the Atlantean asked, looking over at me curiously.

"I didn't like it at all. The other classes were boring, which I'll just have to tolerate, but the history class was a fucking _nightmare_."

Frowning, sea-boy tilted his head curiously. "What happened?"

"We watched a movie about a period of time called a 'World War'." The doors opened and I quickly walked out, the man behind me quietly listening as he followed me outside.

"It specifically focused on the horrors imprisoned humans experienced in some sort of camp." Feeling a fresh set of tears well up in my eyes, I turned to my friend and shook my head frantically, wanting to toss the images from the movie out of my head.

"They were starved and tortured," I whispered, my voice choked with the tightening of my throat. "There were pictures of living men that looked like skin-wrapped _skeletons_ , of execution chambers where the prisoners were forced to murder their friends and family by filling the room with poisonous gas."

Desperately needing the comfort of being near my pack, I stepped forward and clung to sea-boy in a tight embrace. The moment I felt his arms wrap around me a sob broke out, the tears hot against my skin.

" _Millions_ , Sea-boy _._ Millions died in some of the most horrific, unspeakable ways imaginable. _Mountains_ were made out of the thousands of dead bodies piled on the ground and I just….how did I not know? Of all the things I've forgotten, how could such anevil, unforgettable thing like that be one of my lost memories–" I faltered, my weeping intensifying to the point I couldn't talk.

"It made me think of the compound and the brain-machine," I admitted, feeling bile rising in my throat. "The way those poor humans were treated – how they were experimented on and abused," I leaned back, looking into sea-boy pained silver eyes.

"How can they do that?" I whispered. "How do humans have such an endless capability and imagination for evil?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I based a lot of Wolf's reaction on how I felt when my history class covered WWII. It was an advanced class, so they covered a lot of the more in depth and horrifying details and we spent a good several weeks on the subject; it really left an impression on me. The pictures and video we saw, the accounts we read, the scenarios we discussed and played out is still horrifically crystal clear in my brain even years later.

I remember specific faces and the mutilated bodies they belonged to. I remember finding out that approximately six _million_ Jewish people alone were murdered by the Nazis over the course of several short years, with approximately half that astronomical number due to the concentration camps.

I realize this is a touchy subject, and I put serious thought into whether or not to make it as impacting on Wolf as it ended up being, but I think it needed to be done. Most of us grow up having the general knowledge of what WWII was and what kind of horrors occurred then, but can you imagine what it would be like for someone who had absolutely no idea what had happened? The documentaries on the holocaust are _made_ to affect the viewer in as visceral a way as possible. It's _supposed_ to shock you, to horrify you, make you grieve and swear to yourself that if you have a say in it, something like this will _never_ happen again.

With this chapter I'll admit I put a lot of myself into Wolf, which I try not to do as a general rule. First person POV can be tricky, as it's all too easy to turn the character into a mirror of yourself.


	9. Humanity

WARNING: Seriously, super incomplete chapter – one that most likely wouldn't have even made it to the final cut since the timing of events wouldn't make sense.

XX

XX

XX

Pineapple juice?

[Slurps] Ahh.  
Just what the Doctor ordered.

How's the arm doing, Wally? Well, nothing wrong nachos can't cure.

Nachos? Oh! I'll go get you some.

Aah! [Beeps] - [Grunting] - Good work, everyone.  
In fact, it's been a very productive week.  
Yeah, for everyone except kid malingerer.  
Hey! Arm broken in combat against the Injustice League here.  
[Chuckles] I've really enjoyed being your, uh, den mother this week.  
Recognized: Zatara, one, one.  
[Whirring] Access granted.  
Zatanna, Zatara.  
A-zero-3.  
Authorization: Zatara, one, one.  
[Whirring] Zatanna, this is the team.  
Team, my daughter, Zatanna.  
\- Hi! I'm - Robin! Ahem.  
I mean, I'm Robin.  
Heh.  
She's M'gann, and that's Wally, Artemis, Kaldur, and Connor.  
\- Welcome to the Cave.  
\- Thanks.  
So, uh, are you joining the team? Let's not get ahead of ourselves.  
This is strictly a visit.  
But I am sorry we missed the training.  
It's something from which Zatanna could benefit.  
[Thinking]

XX

" _Do the rest of you get the impression we're still on probation with Zatara?"_ Green girl asked, turning to face us with a light frown.

" _Zatara isn't the only one,"_ Connor added grumpily. " _I mean seriously, why is Marvel still hanging around?"_

" _Because we like having him around,"_ Wally protested.

" _Man-boy's my favorite,"_ I agreed wholeheartedly, ignoring the affronted look it earned from my human. Rolling her eyes, blond-girl stared at the injured redhead accusingly.

" _You like having him around 'cause he waits on you hand and foot."_ Turning her pointed look towards me, she lifted an eyebrow with amusement. _"And you just like him because he treats you like a canine Wally."_

" _That's not – "_

" _I've seen you sneaking off to play fetch with him outside more than once, Wolf. Remember that time I caught him – "_

" _You promised you wouldn't talk about that!"_ I mentally shouted, my embarrassment creeping over to the others through the link.

" _Now this I've gotta hear."_ Robin smirked, rubbing his hands evilly.

" _They're going to find out eventually,"_ blond girl prodded. _"You want me to tell them or do I have to do it?"_

"… _..Fine."_ Taking in a deep breath, I closed my eyes and tried to shut out the humiliation of what I was about to admit.

" _I….I grew to like man-boy a lot after you rescued me from India. Since then whenever he saw me he –"_ I swallowed hard and opened my eyes, forcing myself to confront their curious stares.

" _He gave me tummy rubs and dog treats."_

The team stared at me uncomprehendingly for a few seconds.

" _Wait, that's it?"_

" _No. The thing is….he still does it. Whenever I'm a wolf he likes to have me do tricks; if I do them he'll pet my stomach and give me treats as a reward."_

Wally burst out laughing, his injured arm cradled into his stomach as he bent over from the force of his mirth.

"Oh my _god_ Wolf, you seriously crack me up," he gasped out, a stray tear running down his cheeks.

" _Look,"_ blond-girl got back on track with an amused smile _. "Pampering aside, at the end of the day Marvel's just another in the long line of watchful babysitters since Tornado left."_

" _It almost makes one nostalgic for Red Tornado's tenure as our supervisor,"_ sea-boy sighed.

" _Yeah,"_ Robin's smirk became a dark grimace. _"At least he trusted us."_

" _If you ignore the fact we shouldn't have trusted him!"_ Connor interjected incredulously. _"He was a traitor; that machine nearly got all of us killed."_

"Hey," a voice broke in. Looking around, we all turned to face the brunette from earlier. "Are you guys having a psychic conversation?" she asked casually. "Because if you are I can't decide if that's cool or just really rude."

After glancing at each other uncomfortably, Connor stepped forward and addressed the adult heroes now watching us curiously.

"All right, fine; we were talking about 's been weeks since his attack, and the League still hasn't told us _anything_."

"The League is searching for Tornado and the other androids that invaded the Cave as well as their creator, T.O. Morrow," screeching-woman explained patiently. "Batman's made tracking them down our _highest_ priority."

"But you haven't found any of them," Robin argued restlessly.

"Not yet, but Tornado is Justice League. _We_ will find him; the team is not to pursue this."

XX

XX  
Why don't you all take Zatanna on a, uh, a tour of the Cave?

[Snores] Ah.  
You're giving a tour? Cool! Actually, I was hoping you'd take wolf outside.  
He needs the exercise.  
We'll join you in a few.  
Sure, sure.  
I can do that.  
Come on, wolf.  
What – My nachos!

XX

" _You guys are leaving me behind to play distraction with Man-boy while you go off to find this 'Tornado' person, aren't you?"_ I asked resignedly.

" _Sorry Wolf, but it would really help us out if you could keep them busy for a while,"_ Robin replied apologetically.

" _I'll make it up to you,"_ my human promised. He paused for a moment, a smirk in his voice when he spoke again. " _I'll even give you a tummy rub."_

" _I hate you guys sometimes."_

" _Well, now we know all we have to do is feed you a few dog biscuits and you'll do just about anything,"_ Wally taunted.

" _I'm eating your nachos as we speak, Wally. Wow, Man-boy really outdid himself on these too – he actually layered them and used extra cheese and salsa; this might just be his best creation yet."_

" _Aw, man."_

" _We appreciate your cooperation Wolf, and will let you know if we come across any significant clues,"_ Sea-boy promised; a hint of a smile in his tone.

" _Don't worry about it; it'll give me plausible deniability. Let me know how it went when you get back and don't do anything too stupid. Also, don't leave me behind like this again, I don't appreciate being separated from my pack without warning, it makes my wolf edgy. Be safe Co – you guys."_

" _We will,"_ multiple voices chorused.

" _I will,"_ Connor murmured quietly.

XX

XX

So, good kidnapping? Actually, yeah.  
Best ever.  
Heh.  
First of many, I hope.  
If my dad doesn't ground me for life.  
She's grounded for life! "They're good kids, Giovanni.  
" "Don't worry, Giovanni.  
" She's never joining this team.  
Um, are they coming out to play or what?


	10. Failsafe

WARNING: Seriously, basically just wrote the ending for this one. You'll see a bit of how Wolf dies (she takes Wally's place in that respect) and how she and the team wakes up. The stuff before that is just the original episode script, which I like to have as a reference for how things originally went.

XXX

XXX

Deploying camera sensor units.  
Attention.  
You have entered the boundaries of Earth space.  
Disengage all weapons and engines.  
This is your final warning.  
Code red.  
Full offensive deploy.  
Tornado, did you- Yes, Zatara, we saw.  
Celestial defenses have failed.  
Initiate all terrestrial measures.  
Affirmative.  
See you in the field.  
I must join the League.  
We will protect the planet at all costs.  
But should we fail, the responsibility falls to you.  
We stand ready.  
This is Iris West-Allen reporting live.  
The extraterrestrials have brought their relentless global attack to Central City.  
You should both be safe here.  
At least for now.  
Thank youFlash.  
And Zatara.  
Denny, you OK? As you can see, the Justice League is attempting to hold the line.  
No.  
Iris! Iris, get out of there.  
I'm sorry, we're experiencing technical difficulties from our Central City feed.  
We take you now to a devastated Taipei, where another League contingent is having a bit more luck.  
Ladies and gentlemen, we've lost Black Canary, Green Arrow, and the Hawks.  
Other heroes reported dead or missing include Batman, Ikonn, Adam, and Aquaman.  
Wonder Woman, above you.  
Red Tornado to cave.  
I fear I am all that remains of the League.  
R.  
T.  
! We are Earth's heroes now.  
So what are we waiting for, a theme song? A strategy.  
Earth's weapons are ineffective.  
And it has been made tragically clear a direct attack will not succeed.  
Checking satellite imagery.  
Here's where the aliens are now.  
This one get lost? That's Superman's fortress of solitude.  
Superman has a fortress of solitude? Its power source must have attracted the aliens attention, at least enough to send a scout ship to investigate.  
Must be some fortress.  
\- Connor.  
\- No, it's OK.  
I guess there's a lot about Superman I'll never know.  
Uh, you know, now.  
We will target this lone ship.  
Yeah, break it down, build more, hit those ugly aliens with their own mojo.  
Ow! Martian and Kryptonian in the house.  
Uh, heh heh.  
Not that all aliens are automatically ugly.  
Communications disabled.  
Propulsion disabled.  
And ETs are sealed inside.  
Uhh! Identifying weapon's structural stress points and links to the ship.  
Here, here, and here.  
Uhh! Wolf! There was no indication of feedback.  
I'm sorry.  
Can't do anything for him now.  
Let's go.  
Ahh! Rerouting systems to integrate weapon into ship's biomatrix.  
We'll need to decamouflage for a few minutes.  
May not have a few minutes.  
Miss Martian, open fire.  
Can't.  
Weapon systems are offline to incorporate the new cannon.  
And that's not fully integrated yet, either.  
Got you covered.  
Get inside.  
I'm almost there.  
Artemis, behind you.  
Uhh! Artemis! Artemis! Get inside.  
All of you.  
Aah! They're dead.  
Every single alien, if it's the last thing I do.  
Ahh! Ahh! Ahh! There will be time to mourn later.  
Now we have a job to do- defend the Earth and ensure Artemis' sacrifice was not in vain.  
Back to the cave?The hall of justice.  
The human race must know that there are still heroes defending them.  
There is still hope.  
Now! Open fire.  
See? It is Superman.  
I told you he wouldn't leave us out here alone.  
I don't know.  
He looks kind of young.  
Where's the Cape? I'm not Superman.  
I don't know who you are, son, and right now, I don't care.  
You wear the "S" and you got the job done.  
I'm not Superman.  
Tell that to the enemy.  
General Wade Eiling, U.  
S.  
Air Force.  
Aqualad, Justice League.  
We'll help you salvage as many of the aliens' cannons as possible, then we start taking back what is ours.  
They're really gone.  
Uncle J'onn! M'Gann, check his mind.  
Make sure he is whom he appears to be.  
It's him.  
He's real.  
He's alive.  
But we saw you get disintegrated.  
You and Superman.  
And everyone.  
Yes, I remember.  
But I cannot remember how I survived.  
Or how I arrived here.  
Maybe you were density shifting, the beam passed right through you.  
Scrambling your brains along the way.  
My mind is clouded.  
I feel certain I had something important to tell you.  
Hello, Wally, come on.  
I knew it! Look.  
It's giving off zanopenes, the same stuff that powers our zeta tubes.  
This thing doesn't disintegrate, it teleports.  
Artemis is alive.  
\- Maybe, but- - No maybes.  
They're all alive.  
That must have been what you wanted to tell us.  
We're on our way.  
Negative.  
We can't win this.  
Miss Martian, camo the bioship.  
Aah! M'Gann! That didn't feel like- We're falling back.  
We're trapped.  
Maybe not.  
We can all zeta to the cave if you can grant us computer clearance to access the tubes.  
I can only authorize one at a time.  
Send the soldiers first.  
Belay that! You six are assets we cannot afford to lose.  
Override.  
Martian Manhunter 07.  
Recognized.  
Access granted.  
Miss Martian.  
B-0-5.  
Robin.  
B-0-1.  
Kid Flash.  
B-0-3.  
Aah! Aah! - He goes next.  
\- Fine.  
Then you.  
Private Jason Bard.  
USMC.  
\- Can you make it? - Sure, Superman.  
\- I'm not- - Superboy.  
B-0-4.  
They need you more than me.  
Go! Our next mission is clear.  
If we believe the aliens have been teleporting their victims- We do.  
Then the only reasonable detention facility is here.  
Their mothership, atop what used to be Smallville.  
Ring any bells? No.  
I'm sorry.  
Superboy, you'll create a distraction.  
No! He's offering you as a sacrifice.  
Aqualad would never do that.  
You're right.  
Aqualad would sacrifice himself, a mistake that just cost us our leader.  
Superboy is the most likely to be perceived as a threat, motivating the aliens to deploy.  
Worst case, he's teleported inside and we set him free along with Artemis.  
And Aqualad and everyone.  
It's OK, M'Gann.  
It's what Superman would do.  
And though we know all seems lost, the one thing the aliens cannot destroy is hope.  
Hope survives because the battle is not over.  
Not as long as even one of us is willing to fight.  
It doesn't matter how many fall, for new heroes will always rise to carry on, bring all their resources, their skills, their talents to bare, to defeat the enemy.  
The people of Earth will survive this.  
We will rebuild and we will thrive.  
Never doubt and never forget the Earth will never surrender.  
Stay close to J'onn.  
He's still First team, deploy.  
Ahh.  
Ready.  
In position.  
Be careful, Connor.  
I love you.  
Uhh! Grr! Careful.  
Don't disconnect the power source.  
All right, you glorified trespassers.  
You want to see how a real alien fights? Now or never.  
Way's clear.  
Go.  
Dah! No.  
He's gone.  
It's all right.  
We'll find him with Artemis.  
I know it.  
No.  
My mind is clearer now.  
The disintegration beam is exactly that.  
There is no detention facility, no prisoners to rescue.  
Our mission holds no purpose.  
No, you're wrong.  
The zeta radiation proves she's alive.  
\- She's- - Stop it, KF.  
I've been scanning for League and team signals since we got inside.  
They're not here.  
Artemis is gone.  
But our mission still holds purpose- to destroy this mothership.  
Grr! This is the power core.  
Blow this and the whole mothership blows.  
Uhh.  
Uhh! You knew.  
You knew from the beginning why we were really here.  
Let's go.  
\- Perfect.  
\- Huh?

XX

XX

XX

" _Green-man,"_ I barked, catching his attention. Following my lead, Robin matched his gaze and pointed up.

" _Take Miss Martian and go,"_ he ordered, looking grim.

"No, we won't leave you!" Green-girl shouted out loud, looking horrified.

"That's an order M'gann; we'll follow as soon as we blow those doors!" He shouted back. With a final nod, Green-man grabbed the younger girl and shot up, her echoing cry in our ears as they disappeared.

I glanced over at the decreasing numbers still floating above my companion's watch and grimaced, meeting his eyes. He nodded in sad understanding and I stepped forward, burying my face in his neck as we waited for the last six seconds of the countdown.

"See you on the other side Wolf," his voice whispered quietly in my ear. I swallowed and nodded, the tears running down my face hotly.

"Goodbye.…Robin."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Pain. I felt it consume me utterly, each molecule breaking apart one at a time, my skin and bones burning to dust before my very eyes. Combating the physical hurt was the emotional, my heart shattering with the fresh loss of my mate and our pack.

I felt my throat ache with the force of my cries, the screaming howl a pale testament to the agony of my failure to protect the most important person in the world.

Connor. He wasn't supposed to die, I should have protected him, _oh god_ –

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 _Outside, Martian Manhunter and his niece landed_

Don'tDon't tell me the mission was a success.  
The price was too high.  
No.  
No.

No.  
No. We have to get out of here now.  
No, we have to end this now. 

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The next thing I knew, I woke up panting; my head pounding with the worst migraine I'd ever experienced. My throat felt raw and for a second I panicked, my skin crawling with the sensation of being burned and disintegrating to ash.

"–olf," a hoarse voice croaked to my right, making me freeze. I tried opening my eyes, but the flames were too bright, too hot –

A large clammy hand wrapped around my arm, the grip uncomfortably strong –

"Connor?" I whispered, feeling more tears drip down the sides of my face at the fierce pain that shot through my chest at the name; wanting to hope but not daring to think my mate was actually –

"I'm here."

My eyes shot open completely and I looked over, a hard sob forcing its way out when I saw it was really him. I scrambled to get off the table and fell over, landing into him with a hard crash.

"–onnor, Connor, _Connor,"_ I cried into his shoulder, taking in the scent of someone I never thought I'd see again. His arms carefully squeezed around me, picking me up and settling me on his lap as he sat back down on whatever I'd been laying on.

Around me I heard and smelled my pack groaning and shuffling around us and I tried to stifle the tears, wondering for a brief moment if we'd actually died and really _were_ seeing each other on the other side.

"You're all alive!" I heard Green-girl gasp a few feet away, an intense cloud of relief and grief injecting itself into the already crowded area. I glanced over Connor's shoulder and looked around to see we were in the training room; everyone looking haggard and disoriented as they staggered off the circle of pedestal-like tables we'd all been laying on.

"What happened in there?" I heard underwear-man murmur under his breath to the male Martian he was helping up on the other side of the room.

"The exercise….it all went wrong," Insert name groaned, clutching at his head in obvious pain.

"Exercise?" Robin panted lowly, his body drenched in sweat as he tried to lean over on his arms to look at the pair.

"Try to remember," underwear-man replied lowly in a placating tone. "What you experienced was a training exercise. Manhunter psychically linked the seven of you within an artificial reality; something you all knew going in." Pausing with a bitter twist of his lips and smelling of regret, he continued. "What you _didn't_ know was that it was a train for failure exercise; no matter what the team accomplished the scenario was designed to grow worse."

Not giving us time to digest the information, underwear-man sighed and ploughed on. "Still, you were aware nothing was real, including the deaths of the entire Justice League."

"That is why you hardly grieved even when several of your mentors were disintegrated before your eyes," Insert name cut in, his red eyes glancing up with a pained grimace. "But all that changed when Artemis died. Though consciously Miss Martian knew it was not real, her subconscious mind could not make that distinction and she forgot it was only an exercise. Her subconscious took control, making all of you forget too."

Green-girl brought her hand up to her mouth, looking horrified. "I-I'm so sorry," she whispered to the group, the words loud in the deathly silent room.

"This isn't her fault!" Connor tensely defended, his voice loud in my ears. "Why didn't you stop the exercise?!"

"We tried," Insert name answered back quietly. "But M'Gann had a death grip on the scenario. Even Artemis, who should have awakened upon her death, was so convinced she had passed that instead of waking, she slipped into a coma. I realized I would have to wrest control from Miss Martian's subconscious from within, but upon entering the reality I was overwhelmed by your collective emotion."

Looking down at his hands, Insert name smelled pungently of guilt and unease. "There was too much noise to think clearly, to remember why I was there…..The deaths of Aqualad, Kid Flash, and Superboy helped," he admitted without much emotion. "But only when the mother ship exploded and Robin and Wolf were silenced did my mind clear enough to remember my true purpose…..to shock M'Gann out of the exercise before your comas became permanent."

Looking up, Insert name regarded us all with regret. "My apologies. I had no idea a training exercise could be so dangerous.…or so damaging." Trying to stand up, Insert name stumbled and would have fallen if underwear-man hadn't caught him in time.

"As bad as all that?" the cowled hero asked quietly. After a moment Insert name nodded. "Perhaps worse," he admitted.

"….But this isn't what troubles you."

"Make no mistake, my niece is untrained and cannot be held responsible for this – for _our_ debacle."

"No one blames her," underwear-man reassured, "but clearly we underestimated her abilities."

"You understate it," Insert name replied ominously. "In terms of raw power, she has the strongest telepathic mind I have ever encountered….stronger by far than mine."

Deciding they weren't talking about anything important anymore, I ignored them and pulled back to look at Connor's face. His blue eyes met mine and as we regarded each other silently, unsure of how to act or what to say to each other after something like this.

Things weren't okay, and I had no idea how any of us would change that.


	11. Disordered

WARNING: You know the drill. Bits and pieces, but this chapter is a bit more fleshed out. Kinda felt like a filler episode, but still planning to keep it in.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It was a little after 5 o'clock - almost time for dinner. Instead of eating however, I found myself sitting outside a door that had become painfully familiar over the last few weeks as I waited for my human to finish a therapy session with a female I knew he regarded as a mother figure and mentor.

Leaning my head against the wall, I couldn't help feeling sad as I listened to what was quickly becoming an unproductive conversation between the two of them.

"I can only imagine how devastating it was. Losing your friends, in essence your family, convinced all the time it was completely real…..I'm sure it must have been horrible for you," she commented sympathetically, only to be met with silence.

Even through the wall I could practically feel the glare he sent her. With a continued patience that only amazed me more with every unsuccessful session they'd had so far, she continued to try and break though to him.

"I do understand how you feel, you know. You're Superboy – you're not supposed to have feelings of sadness or vulnerability."

 _Shit. When will she learn not to trigger him like that?_ I thought in exasperation before a predictably loud and overly-dramatic outburst of "You don't know _what_ I feel!" came from my emotionally challenged human. Knowing the drill, I stepped away from the door so I wouldn't get hit when it was violently ripped open.

"Conner!" She called out in a last desperate attempt to convince him to stay, most likely already knowing the futility of her actions as the door opened with enough force that the door handle left a dent in the wall it bounced off of. Seeing the pissed off look in the face of the teenager illuminated in the doorway, I didn't bother trying to greet him and silently let him pass by as he stomped down the hall. Hearing her quiet steps follow him out of the room, he shouted a final "Just leave me alone!" before going around the corner.

Taking a step forward to follow him, I was stopped by a hand on my shoulder. Having come out of the room herself, bird-woman was now looking up at me with a serious look on her face. "I haven't forgotten about you either Wolf. I know it's uncomfortable for you to shift, but I think we should have a talk. What happened during the training exercise affected you too."

Looking away from her face, I glanced in the direction Connor had gone and pushed down the anxious growl itching to leave my throat. I needed to find him and make sure he would be okay.

"See?" She asked, bringing my attention back to her. Brushing the blond shoulder-length hair back from her face, she met my eyes with her own for a second to make sure I was paying attention before instinctively lowering them a fraction.

"I don't think you've left his side even once since the incident. I know you care about him and I appreciate that he has someone to watch his back while he's working through his own feelings, but don't forget to take care of yourself too. When the two of you come back will you please come find me? I have to go back to headquarters and file my reports from today, but I'll be back tomorrow to talk with you all some more."

Letting out a long sigh, I considered her words for a moment before slowly nodding my head in acceptance. Needing to find my human before he did something stupid, I took off in a jog in his direction, following the scent of his anger and self-loathing. Eventually padding to the garage, I got there in time to see him making his way to the hangar door on a red motorcycle.

"Red Tornado, hangar door." He called out to the computer over the low rumble of his motorcycle. Knowing I wouldn't reach him in time to stop him, I was relieved to see Sphere shoot past me and roll in front of the opening door, blocking the exit. Knowing Sphere wouldn't let him leave without me, I padding lightly after to them and sat next to the annoyed Kryptonian, watching in vague amusement as he tried to get it to move.

"Sphere, out of the way! I don't have time for-"

XX

XX

"Let's see what our boy can do." I could smell the delight rolling of him in waves, and heard him give a shout of excitement in to the cool air before dipping down and riding an air current.

"Return the new Genisphere, and the rest of the technology you have stolen from New Genesis, human."

"Who are you?! What do you

"Let's keep this simple. _That_ ," he said emphatically, pointingdown at motorcycle-sphere, "belongs to us. So give. It. Back."

"Forever People, stand down. This one did not steal the new Genisphere, he saved it from the real thieves."

"Apologies!" the gruff teen called out, now smiling widely. "The Forever People embrace you as a friend, ally, and worthy warrior."

"You're kidding, right?" Connor scoffed in disbelief. I couldn't blame him – this entire exchange had done a complete one-eighty and our intruder's sudden friendliness was throwing me off as well.

"Who are you anyway?"

"Us? We are the Forever People," he stated as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "We are young gods; new gods."

"….Right." Connor agreed doubtfully, his forehead furrowing in uncertainty.

"They call me Serifan."

"I'm Dreamer."

"This is Moonrider, and our leader Vykin."

"And I am named for an animal that does not exist on this world…..but," he added with a smile, "you may call me Wolf."

"This is Wolf," Connor replied back testily, gesturing to me with a tense jerk of his head. I honestly didn't mind if the odd man shared the same name as me, but figured now wasn't the time to try and make my opinion known.

Shrugging, in a no-skin-off-my-back gesture, he thought for a moment before coming up with another name.

"Ah! Bear, then. Yes, Bear is even better."

I rolled my eyes. Wolf was _so_ much better than Bear.

"I'm Con- Superboy," Connor introduced hesitantly, the slipup unusual. I glanced at him out of the corner of my eyes, and he shook his head imperceptibly.

"This is Mother Box, the living computer. She has tracked technology stolen from our home world, New Genesis and has recently found our rescue drill there."

"It is beneath us, 18 meters underground."

"That's a construction site. Perfect cover for drilling…Especially with the Federal Reserve conveniently located across the street."

The government keeps money there," he further explained.

"It's a heist!" the blond one exclaimed excitedly, standing up with his guns pointed in the air. "Come on, partners, let's ride in there guns a-blazin' and round up them outlaws!" he called out in an old western accent, dancing from foot to foot.

"….He's watched a lot of Earth Westerns," the female godling explained lowly, looking embarrassed.

"Yeah, well, there's a time to go in strong and a time to go in smart."

"It is your world Superboy," their leader acquiesced peaceably. "We shall follow your lead."

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"Norman! I brought you a jacket," the woman called out with a sweet smile, holding up the clothing.

" _Mom?"_ The man asked in disbelief. "What are you doing here?!"

Mom, get down! It's not safe.

A billion in bullion, Ugly," a redheaded woman smirked as she glanced over the blocks of gold being transported out of the bank. "That old creep's gear performed as advertised."

"Yeah Whisper," a man's voice agreedfrom behind some rocks. "Gave me a score that tops any my old man ever delivered to Intergang."

"Wait!" Connor whispered, reaching out to stop him. "Guess we decided on the direct approach after all," he muttered mutinously, glancing back at me in exasperation.

"That drill and these carts are the property of New Genesis; you _will_ return them now."

Connor stood and walked towards the group too. "The gold goes back too," he added cooly.

"Interfere and things get ugly," the redhead threatened, standing aside to reveal a stocky black haired man with a thick mustache.

"I'm Ugly," the man introduced with a nasty smile, lifting the strange looking gun in his arms and immediately shooting.

Insert name used his powers to create a shield of earth before pushing Connor aside

These weapons aren't from New Genesis.  
They are of the enemy.

What enemy?

They are of the enemy.

What enemy? The enemy.  
The gods of anti-life.  
These weapons are of Apokolips.

The confines of this tunnel favor their weapons, let us bring this battle into the open.

More room at the top! They're getting away! Move! I have no wish to prolong this battle.

Finish him.

Fear not.  
She will protect us.

Who, Dreamer?

The new Genisphere.

Cool.  
Wait.  
Sphere's a she?

It is time.

Time for what?

All: Taruu!

Okay.  
That's new.

Ugly, wait! Wait!

What was that?

Infinity-Man.  
We merged to become part of the Source, and greater than the sum of our parts.

"Glad my team's not that close," Connor commented, crossing his arms guardedly.

"Lower beings tend to…fear intimacy," Bear replied with a shrug.

I snorted, huffing out a low laugh while I ignored the scowl Connor sent my way. Bear shot me a curious look and I glanced back at him innocently, thumping my tail on the ground for good measure.

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None of this makes any sense.  
How are these humans acquiring technology from both New Genesis and Apokolips?

I'm not talking.

You were not asked.  
Desaad.

"Look, I've been remarkably patient –" I shot him a side glance and he quickly amended, "Well, for me anyway. But seriously, _what_ is going on?"

The New gods come from two worlds at war.  
Those of us from New Genesis are gods of life, freedom, and the Source.  
Our enemies from Apokolips are gods of anti-life, slavery, and degradation.  
This is Desaad, god-scientist and chief torturer of Apokolips.  
His experiments are pure evil; his works, abominations.  
His master Unspeakable.

He is seriously creepy.

XX

"Mother Box says there's a large cache of Apokoliptian technology inside."

"Infrared vision shows no heat signatures, but even so…." Connor added in, glancing back at me. Noticing something, I pawed at his belt; silently asking if he thought it would be okay for me to shift.

Looking surprised, Connor hesitated and looked back at the others before slowly nodding. "You sure?" He asked, waiting for my confirmation before sighing and lifting off his shirt.

"What are you doing?" Dreamer asked in confusion while the others stared. I grabbed the shirt with my teeth and hid behind the still-transformed sphere, crouching low to shift while Connor explained what was happening.

"Wolf's going to shift so she can tell us something. She wouldn't do it if it weren't important," Connor added, making my lips twitch into a small smile despite the pain of the shift. A few seconds later the last couple of bones snapped into place and I sighed in relief, pulling the shirt over me with shaking fingers before stepping out from behind Sphere, patting the cool metal affectionately as I walked back over to the surprised godlings with a smile.

"You have changed forms!" Bear remarked in interest, his eyes looking me over curiously. Looking displeased when the man's eyes lingered over me a little too long, Connor stepped closer to me and crossed his arms with a frown.

"I'm Wolf," I introduced with a nod, placing a comforting hand on Connor's back. "I generally try not to shift out in the open like this, but you need to know that I'm smelling about a dozen different scents in the area, all very recent. Even if they're not inside, they're definitely nearby; maybe waiting as a trap."

"It is possible they are using cloaking technology," the godling leader replied. "But Motherbox would have alerted us if it detected such. We thank you for your input Wolf, and will proceed carefully."

"We should do a perimeter search," I insisted. "Do a quick sweep and try to pinpoint exactly where they are. If we just go in there without any reconnaissance we could be walking into a situation that ends

XX

XX

I frowned, feeling intensely uneasy with the situation. Pulling back, I tugged on Connor's arm to catch his attention.

"We need more information, more planning. Going in without that is how we end up dead again," I whispered anxiously, my mind flashing back to the fiery end we'd experienced several weeks prior. "I can't watch you die again," I admitted painfully, hating how afraid I felt in that moment.

"We don't have much choice, these guys obviously aren't too familiar with the recon-style team you and I are used to," he replied quietly. "

XX

XX

"Still no heat signatures," Connor murmured cautiously, glancing around. I felt my stomach drop with dread as I immediately caught the same scents from earlier – only they were a lot stronger now. "The place is definitely deserted – though I could be wrong," Connor trailed off in a worried voice when he saw me frantically shaking my head, trying to warn the group without making any noise.

Too late, we saw thirteen people appear out of nowhere, their guns trained on us as the sound of their heartbeats and breathing suddenly filled the room.

"This tech masks sound and heat signatures," the mustachioed man from earlier informed us with a sneer as he pointed to a semi-see through visor in front of his face. "The visor filters out illusions; we saw through ya from the beginning."

XX

XX

These weapons resist my magnetic power.  
We'll soon be overrun.  
It is time.  
This won't take long!

Go!

All: Taruu!

Now, mortal.  
Deliver the Father Box.

That can't be good.

Kill the boy and his little dog too.

 _Connor!_ I barked out, immediately running after him.

XX

Wait!

"Good uh, girl. We'll take him down together!" Instead of its usual mechanical beeping response, the sphere turned and rolled away, leaving the two of us staring after it with dumbfounded looks as it left us behind.

Fuck.

"Yeah, can't really blame you," Connor muttered cynically while we turned back to face the giant, god-powered robot preparing to murder us.

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Infinity-Man is now my-My master's weapon.

Why doesn't he get it over with?

I am not one for getting it over with.  
Father Box knows my proclivities, and programmed Infinity-Man accordingly.

Attack! Attack while you still can!

Sphere, you're beautiful!

Open fire! All weapons!

Our turn.  
Think I'm getting the hang of this.  
Pull! Now, that's ugly.

Desaad!

All will suffer. All will suffer!

She's hurt!

The damage may be beyond repair, but Mother Box will try.  
The healing process has begun and will be completed on New Genesis.

Sorry, what?

We thank you for your help, Superboy, but we must take the new Genisphere home now.

way!

Why should we leave her with you? To us, she lives.  
To you, she's merely technology.

No, it's not like that.

Then what is it like?

We bonded, ok?

In fact, it is.  
You may keep her.

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"You know what, Canary? Fine; I'll talk to you."

Perking up, I felt my ears twitch back to better hear what my human was saying.

"Here's the ugly truth. I wasn't devastated. Even with Superman, Tornado, you, the whole League dead and even though I–" I heard his voice hesitate a moment, as if unsure he should continue.

"Even though I left Wolf behind and couldn't save her, and watched Artemis and Kaldur die, and abandoned M'gann I felt…..at peace."

Confused, I did a double-take; turning my head to stare at the wall behind me as if I could suddenly see through it to the person it kept me separated from.

"See," he continued, "from the moment I first opened my eyes in that Cadmus pod, there's been one thing I've wanted and feared. To know what it is to be Superman."

I heard him swallow softly, and imagined the serious look of concentration on his face. Knowing him, he probably had his hands clasped so he wouldn't look like he was fiddling with them.

"And now I know what it's like to be the man of steel; to be the respected and idolized hero that I was supposed to be just like. I – I was _happy_ ," he whispered. "Everyone I care about dead or traumatized and I'm actually _happy_."

With a sinking heart, I listened as he explained himself.

"How do I get past the guilt of that?" he asked in a voice that pleaded for forgiveness. "How do I live with myself knowing that even when I knew Wolf might die, that all my friends were dead or probably going to die I felt like I'd found the moment I was created for? That fulfilling that need for purpose overrode everyone and everything else to the extent I could feel _happy_ ," he spit the word out with growing disgust, "while hundreds – no, _thousands_ were dying."

There was a long pause before Canary answered back. When she did though, I wasn't really listening. I felt a confusing mix of emotions swirling through me and I wasn't quite sure how to deal with them.

"Hello, Wolf. Is Connor waiting outside for you?" Nodding, I decided to get straight to the point. I wasn't sure how long he'd be willing to stick around for, and I wanted him to hear what I had to say.

"Yes. And before you ask, yes; I heard what he said. I know he can hear me too, which is good, because I want you both to know that I'm sorry."

Surprised, the blond looked at me curiously. "Sorry for what?"

"I was being selfish, hovering outside the door every time you tried to talk. Connor probably had a harder time trying to tell you how he was feeling because he didn't want to hurt my feelings." Looking over at the door, I listened for his heartbeat, relieved to still hear it outside the door even if it _was_ a little faster than usual.

"I'm sorry Connor," I spoke to the door. "I know I became a little overprotective these last couple of weeks – I kind of overreacted after the simulation."

"That's completely understandable, considering what you went through," bird-woman consoled. Glancing at the door as well, she raised an eyebrow enquiringly. "Wolf, would you prefer that Connor was here with you?"

My instant reaction was to say yes, but I knew I couldn't say it. My human had just been through an emotionally raw and uncomfortable breakthrough and I knew if I asked he would probably come in no matter how uncomfortable it made him.

"Only if he wants to," I eventually decided. Immediately, the door handle turned and a subdued Connor reeking of guilt slid through the crack he made as he opened the door. Closing it behind him quietly, the brunette side-stepped to the wall and leaned against it, his gaze refusing to turn to either one of us.

I felt a brief moment of my own guilt slide through me at the relief and pleasure I felt that he'd come in.

"It sounds like you were one of the last to have the scenario end for you," bird-woman commented neutrally, immediately starting with the topic I felt most uncomfortable with.

"We were trapped on the ship," I murmured. "Robin made green-man run away with green-girl by promising we would follow behind, but we both knew there was no way we could escape in the time left. We had to sit there and wait for death," I admitted with a grimace.

Looking sad, bird-woman leaned forward. "I can't even imagine how horrible that must have been," she comforted sadly. I looked back at Connor and steeled myself for what I was about to say next.

"It was terrifying, but….I was also relieved. Losing Connor, seeing him completely disintegrate in front of me – tasting the fucking _ash_ that I inhaled and was covered in was just –" I gagged, remembering the horror I'd felt at realizing what, or rather _who_ that ash had come from.

"Do you need to throw up?" bird-woman asked, looking alarmed. I shook my head and shut down the images running through my head.

"No, sorry, I'm fine. Losing Connor, losing my pack….it devastated me. I basically shut down emotionally until the end, and it was only in that last thirty seconds of sitting there with Robin and waiting to die that I allowed myself to remember that the person I care about most in the world was dead, and never coming back. Knowing that surviving meant living without him in a world devastated by this attack was unbearable, and….."

I shifted and looked down, feeling ashamed. "We didn't have a choice; there was no way to escape and we were going to die. I know that. But even so, what we were doing felt like….suicide. I mean," I quickly tried to clarify, seeing the look on her face, "it _was_ a suicide mission. I think fast-boy and green-girl were the only ones still in denial over what we were there to do, and I had a feeling going in that I probably wouldn't be coming back out. But still, instead of feeling trapped; at the end I felt….acceptance. Even relief."

I couldn't bring myself to look up at Connor and breathed shallowly, trying not to pick up his scent. "I think that what Connor felt, we _all_ felt to an extent. As terrible as the situation was, it still showed us that we were capable of doing what the team all wished to do someday – step up and fulfill the role the adult heroes have every single day. That scenario was the moment that proved that all our training and work, all our frustration with being looked down on or underestimated by you guys or the public was worth it; that in the end we're not only willing, but _able_ to do sacrifice anything, _do_ anything that was needed to save the world."

I finally looked up at Connor and saw him staring at me, his eyes wide. "We _all_ felt what you did Connor. We all felt validated as heroes and leaders when the world looked to us to save them."

Feeling more confident, I looked back at bird-woman and continued speaking. "I

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